A sobering article entitled “After Your Job Is Gone” is a must-read for everyone who is employed right now. The central point of the article is that computerized automation already has made many Americans unable to keep jobs that they have held for years. This is not a future prediction This is now.

What would you do if technology destroyed your relevance as a worker? For us avid science fiction fans, such a question is as old as I, Robot, the classic speculative science fiction story from 1950 written by Isaac Asimov. Of course, many Americans tend to ignore science fiction as mere entertainment. That is, of course, a big mistake.

The most practical response you and I can have to technology destroying more jobs than it creates is to work in technology businesses. You will not be able to beat technology. So, you will have to join technology if you want to adapt and survive. This crucial need to adapt and survive is already especially challenging for people who have the false belief that technology is only for young people.

I will repeat here today what I posted earlier this year at this website:

When you live in the 21st century, you need to embrace and use the tools of the 21st century or you will become as relevant as dinosaurs. If you scoff at this, you are choosing to be a scoffing dinosaur.

How many birthdays you have had doesn’t matter one bit. Whether you like using computers or smart phones doesn’t matter either.

If you are in a career search in the wake of the Great Recession, you want to stand out. You definitely do not want to be a scoffing dinosaur. The choice is very simple and it is your choice alone: Relevant. Irrelevant.

You must embrace and use the tools of the 21st century if you are in a career search in the wake of the Great Recession or you will likely not succeed in your career search.

A very recent echoing of this wisdom came from Jeff Immelt, Chairman and CEO at GE. Read his simple, yet profound message to a graduating class of college students to see what I mean.

Immelt’s core message is powerful and merits requoting here: “We can’t wait for the economy to stabilize. We can’t wait for a time when there is more certainty. It used to be that you only had to manage momentum. Today, you have to create your own future.”

I’m not sure how I came to be someone who embraces that kind of viewpoint about life. I just do embrace it. Wholeheartedly.

I have been reinventing who I am for many years. Long before I ever heard of the word reinvention, I was doing it in my own life.

That is partly why I write commentaries here on this website. My goal is to share with you what I have discovered to be true. I hope your life can benefit from the lessons I have learned.

Since my youth I’ve heard the phrase, “fake it ’til you make it.” To me, the phrase always seemed to be sarcastic and more than just a little shallow. I used to wonder why anyone would want to be fake given the choice to be real. Then I became an adult.

My favorite quote of all time springs from my own lifelong search to tell the difference between fake people and real people. Julius Henry Marx lived from 1890 to 1977 and is best remembered by his nickname, Groucho. He was an American writer and comic with a profound ability to turn deeply intellectual thoughts into everyday language and make people laugh in the process. My favorite quote of all time comes from him: The secret to life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.

The ability to find humor in the struggle to separate what is fake from what is real is crucial to your being successful in shaping your own personal brand so that you stand out in positive ways from others. I firmly believe this.

I recommend that this weekend you should rent a movie called O Lucky Man to explore the humor in how people work so hard to stand out. This film stars Malcom McDowell, a talented actor whose face and voice you will recognize instantly because he has appeared in so many films over the years. McDowell was just 30 when he starred in O Lucky Man as a struggling young man trying to stand out from others and become successful in a professional career. This film is a comedy whose main purpose is to make you laugh so that the filmmakers can sneak in persuasive messages in the story to compel you to think about the differences between fake people and real people.

At this point in my life, I have somehow managed to live and work in Hollywood, Washington, DC, and Las Vegas. Being in these three famous American cities severely confuses anyone who hopes to tell the difference between fake people and real people. You’ll just have to trust me on this if you have never spent any time in any of these places.

Each of us must arrive at our own answers as to whether we are being dishonest if we ever fake it to stand out from others. There probably are moral considerations here, but I dare not tell you what you should consider to be moral. You must find your own way. You would be wise, however, to keep in mind that what is fake versus real often is in the eye of the beholder like truth and beauty.

Let me tell you about it: This past week I finished producing an electronic book (eBook) and associated online promotional campaign for a Southern California newspaper columnist. He is Don Barrett and he has covered the radio broadcasting business for nearly 20 years online at LARadio.com. Don turned to me to produce a series of eBooks for him to chronicle personal stories of USA radio people. I also produced the promotional website to support the marketing of Don’s eBook series.

Having your own eBook available for sale online gives you a special klout that others do not have. Your eBook will be available online around the world for all time. This gives you a true permanence for your good reputation.

Anyone can write a compelling eBook to sell online. Whether you are sharing your family’s secret recipes, other family secrets, or, how-to tips that you have accumulated from your hobby or professional career, publishing an eBook is the way to get your ideas and your reputation out there to the entire world!

You can stand out from others if you have an eBook available for sale online on Amazon. Oh, and yes, you can make money from selling your eBook on Amazon, too. I approach this more from a reputation enhancement perspective, however, and not as a way for people to make money online. But, there are people who do make money from selling eBooks.

Get started today by checking out what I can do for you to help you stand out with your own eBook.

Because I lived and worked in the Boston media market years ago, I will always feel a deep connection to Boston and to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Like many other Americans, this week I was horrified to watch the media coverage of the Boston Marathon bombings and the subsequent hunt for the men who chose to kill and injure innocents on Patriot’s Day.

It is easy to think that there are no lessons to be learned from what happened this past week in Boston in the context of trying to stand out in your professional life and with your personal brand. If you think that, you are wrong.

Readers of my online column on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website know by now that to stand out is to choose to be unique in positive ways while deliberately working smart towards separating yourself in meaningful ways from your professional competitors.

I saw a commentary on CBS News about two traits that were vividly demonstrated in Boston this past week in response to the Boston Marathon bombings. I want to share that commentary with you because of my humble opinion that the two traits mentioned on CBS News can be applied to any one of us who wants to stand out from our professional competitors.

The two traits and competence and courage. I agree with the commentator that these traits are rare today. But, to have competence and courage is a choice. There’s still time in your life to achieve both of these crucial traits if you expect to stand out. Achieving these traits won’t happen by accident. You must be deliberate. You must choose to have these traits actively and with forethought.

Enough context setting; now I encourage you to follow this link to the CBS News commentary to learn more.

No irony is intended here. The reality is that yes, you can succeed in standing out while conducting a search for a career job or any job if you just step away from your computer.

If you read something in the Wall Street Journal, you want to believe it, right? That publication is a central source for business information in the United States today. So, why not trust it?

Read this WSJ article to learn what it means for your search for a career job when 80% of the jobs are not publicly advertised.

This post also appears on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website.

I read a consumer law blog post this week about an investigation into one of the online companies that I paid to help me with my career advancement. The post concerned possible fraud and deception. These are words that you do not ever want to see associated with an online company that you have paid to help you with your career advancement. Just saying.

So, perhaps I was taken advantage of. Perhaps not. I don’t have enough information yet to make this determination.

But, there is a major lesson I want to share with you: Please be extremely careful before you pay anybody to help you with career advancement–especially online companies that you have only encountered on your computer screen or hand-held device. In my opinion, you really should only choose to pay someone who has been recommended to you by someone that you can trust.

My recommendation (as someone that you can trust) is to only go with career advancement companies (online or brick and mortar) that get you at least three job interviews. You can try out career advancement companies and pay them for a very short period of time. However, if you do not get at least three job interviews that you can attribute directly to the particular career advancement company, you need to drop that company quickly. Don’t spend another dime with any career advancement company that fails to get you at least three job interviews.

I have written several times here in this blog that I pay for the services of LinkedIn.com and they happen to be a career advancement company that has gotten me more than three job interviews. I would never make a recommendation to you unless I had tested it out in real life for myself.

There are many, many other career advancement companies out there. My humble opinion is that it is better to be super cautious and not pay for career advancement online with most companies. You may be risking your money on something that may be worth very little in return.

This post also appears on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website.

Helping yourself to be deliberate specifically involves using a certain amount of psychology. Don’t worry, this is something you can do on your own. You don’t necessarily need prescription drugs or medical specialists. The psychology works best if you ask yourself some difficult questions to test whether what you look like on the outside is deliberate or accidental:

Are you going out in public today with clothing that you deliberately chose with rips and tears in the fabric?

Did you choose to embed that shiny metal ring through your nostrils?

Are you walking out into the world today having made the deliberate choice not to wash your hair?

Did you choose to allow your breath to smell like you ate rotting meat an hour ago?

There is a point to these absurdly ridiculous questions: Every element about your outward appearance comes down to a choice on your part. And, whether you chose it or not, people are going to perceive that you made the choice. Read more.

This post also appears on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website.

These are all good questions. Answering these questions may prove to be difficult, however.

The effective start date of the sequester was March 1, 2013. Nobody really knows what precisely will happen now that the sequester is underway. Can anyone answer questions about when the impact of the sequester will be felt? Some reports say that effects upon employment will not be felt until April 1. Does this mean that we all have until April 1 to get ready for the sequester?

If you happen to live in the Washington, DC metropolitan area, the sequester is a major topic of discussion. Will you lose your federally-funded job? Will you be forced to take every Friday off without pay to keep your federally-funded job?

I moved away from the Washington, DC metropolitan area six months ago after having lived and worked there for nearly twenty years. You may have seen what I wrote about these experiences elsewhere online.

Now that the sequester start date has arrived, I want to share an honest reality with you:

One motivating reason for my choice to leave the Washington, DC metropolitan area was the unanswerable questions I had about whether it is sufficiently secure to have a life and a career in the Washington, DC metropolitan area where making a living depends so deeply upon the decisions and behaviors of the federal government.

I was never a federal employee. But, for many years I worked inside federal agencies in the Washington, DC metropolitan area. I worked for various companies the Washington, DC metropolitan area who paid contractors like me using federal dollars that the companies received from the federal government for Department of Defense and Department of Justice work that I performed.

From first-hand experience, I know what it feels like to attend employee meetings where the top person in charge of the federal agency says things like this:

“We don’t know if our funding will continue at the present levels. We don’t know if anyone’s job is in jeopardy. We are working hard right now to get answers that we know you want and need. Meanwhile, don’t worry.”

When I first arrived in the Washington, DC metropolitan area in 1995, I saw all around me how it was considered a very desirable thing to be an employee who was paid directly or indirectly by the federal government. By the time I chose to leave the Washington, DC metropolitan area, that desirability had faded.

This post also appears on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website.

I am vice president of electronic communications on the board at the Las Vegas chapter of IABC. My Las Vegas presentation “How Powerful People Use Digital and Online Channels” was postponed, but wait! Here’s a very cool online version that you will definitely want to check out.

It is never too late to start on your way to relevance. You, too, can become one of those powerful people who know how to use digital and online channels.

I am offering a special discount to help empower you by building your online presence for you and training you how to use this new power effectively. You will definitely want to take advantage of this special discount before it’s too late.

This post also appears on Ned Lundquist’s Job of the Week website.

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A few days ago I posted here telling you of my enthusiasm and excitement for Amazon Kindle eBooks. I want to continue on this topic because I sincerely believe you can stand out with your own eBook that can enable you to claim your own place in the future.

While I’m convinced we will always have books made of paper, the future belongs to the eBook format. I’m also a true believer in the fact that you can claim your own place in that future.

If you get past the b.s. about how everyone can get rich quickly with an eBook, the reality is pretty exciting nonetheless. The financial viability of Amazon is well-known. You can also believe the buzz about eBooks and the device named Kindle. To ignore Amazon and Kindle and eBooks right now is to miss out of an emerging and revolutionary communications channel. This is no exaggeration.

I invite anyone who wants to learn about how to stand out with your own eBook on Amazon to contact me at lasvegaswoody@gmail.com today.

I look forward to hearing from you today!

Long ago, you bought into the dream that AARP sold aggressively for decades along with affordable insurance plans. Simply stated, the dream you bought into was about you and your future.

You put in your time at work. You maybe changed jobs once or twice. Mainly, you put in your time. Why? You bought into the dream. That’s why.

It was a comforting dream to embrace. You saw yourself in the future with gray hair and wisdom. You saw yourself playing golf all day in this dream. You dreamed of drinking ice tea on the front porch with your significant other as the two of you smile at the schoolchildren who walk by.

Your smiles in this dream came from one simple reality: You don’t have to go to work. Those days are behind you. No more grumpy boss. No more annoying coworkers. No more commute. No more business attire. No more computers or cell phones.

You dreamed of transitioning from the world of work into the world of retirement. Ah, what a lovely dream it was!

Hey, wake up! No time to dream like this.

The Great Recession changed almost everything in our lives. Nowadays, the concept of retirement seems somehow absurd. How can you retire? You need to keep working to keep generating revenue to support yourself and your significant other!

If you’ve been lucky enough to keep your home, the concept of wealth from selling your home at an inflated price also seems somehow absurd now. How can you possibly sell your home when it is worth less than what you currently owe on it?

So you think you can retire. Or, so you thought. Past tense. You’re beginning to accept ever so slowly that retirement is not in the cards for you.

Fantasizing about playing golf all day or sitting on the front porch drinking ice tea seems somehow absurd right now.

Growing older does not necessarily usher in relaxing days on the fairway. Not after the Great Recession.

Old concepts about carefree leisure years that follow decades of work have been pushed into absurdity and irrelevance. Instinctively, you know you need a new set of concepts to carry you forward while you keep working to keep generating revenue to support yourself and your significant other.

The concept of retirement seems more and more irrelevant each day. So many other outmoded ways of thinking no longer apply in contemporary life: Our planet is not the center of the universe. Nor is it flat. Or hollow. Changing the Constitution to make alcohol illegal did not create a safer or healthier society. Owning a house will not guarantee you wealth in the near future. You get the idea here.

Refocusing your life is what’s needed now. You know that.

All of us in the United States are living during a time of powerful paradigm shifts brought on by massive economic, cultural, and political changes. These commentaries on this website are here to help you find ways to survive in these challenging times in which we live by developing a viable personal brand.

Share you comments and suggestions with me. I look forward to hearing from you today!

Helping yourself to be deliberate specifically involves using a certain amount of psychology. Don’t worry, this is something you can do on your own. You don’t necessarily need prescription drugs or medical specialists. The psychology works best if you ask yourself some difficult questions to test whether what you look like on the outside is deliberate or accidental:

Are you going out in public today with clothing that you deliberately chose with rips and tears in the fabric?

Did you choose to embed that shiny metal ring through your nostrils?

Are you walking out into the world today having made the deliberate choice not to wash your hair?

Did you choose to allow your breath to smell like you ate rotting meat an hour ago?

There is a point to these absurdly ridiculous questions: Every element about your outward appearance comes down to a choice on your part. And, whether you chose it or not, people are going to perceive that you made the choice.

If you are a celebrity who makes a lot of money selling music internationally and you want to embed a shiny metal ring through your nostrils, then why are you reading this blog post? The same is true for any of you who are so wealthy that you don’t give a damn how dirty your hair may look in the direct sunlight.

But, for everyone else, please pay close attention.

Not To Decide Is To Decide

It is ironic, but true, that not to choose is to choose. If you don’t care that you have unwashed hair, that not caring on your part turns out to become a deliberate choice that ensures you will look sloppy and lazy when you go out in public. Did you accidentally not shower this morning? Another difficult question for you.

Whether we like it or not, our outward appearance is going to be perceived by others out in public as though it were a deliberate choice. So we all need to get used to making smart choices and leave nothing to fate or accidents.

Your personal brand is first going to be noticed by the way you look on the outside. But, there is also much more than merely how you look. Every body gives off scents. The particular scents that your body gives off are also part of how you are perceived by others out in the world who are near you. If you have bad breath, few people (even dentists) will want to come near your face. If your armpits or other parts of your body give off a strong odor, few people will want to come near you.

If you go to a job interview without first getting your outward looks in order, you are asking for trouble. This goes way beyond the standard concept of dressing for success in business by choosing to wear appropriate attire at job interviews. The point is that your outward looks cannot completely be taken care of by wearing appropriate attire. You must pay attention to your appearance beyond your choice in attire: Your personal brand will be enhanced if you have clean hair and skin, no metal objects stuck anywhere on your face, and that fresh, minty taste in your mouth.

Within You and Without Out You

These are not just poetic lyrics from George Harrison. The inner you affects the outer you in many ways. This is unavoidable and completely within your own control. Here, too, is a bit of psychology.

Perhaps it may surprise you to learn that what you are on the inside does not necessarily have to be revealed outwardly to anyone. Many people never learn this. Many people grow up raised to put a premium on personal truthfulness at all times. Don’t be one of those people because personal truthfulness is overrated if you want to succeed with the best possible personal brand.

One important reality of the 21st century is that your reality need not be shared in detail with everyone around you. If someone asks you how you are doing, you should resist the temptation to be truthful and genuine, especially if you are not feeling very happy and focused at the moment. Social media and handheld devices have created a world in which you can instantly share what you had for breakfast as if anyone really needs to know that you enjoyed mouth-watering scrambled eggs topped with jalapeño chili peppers and lemon slices. Some things are just best left inside you.

A useful example may make this clearer. If, on the inside, you feel shy and have apprehension about going out in public to interact with strangers, you should learn how to not reveal that about yourself outwardly in public if you want to be a success in this life. The same holds true for anything else that is inside of you and is not overtly visible outwardly to others. Shyness need not be overtly visible outwardly to others. The same holds true for any of your internal characteristics or traits.

Consider, for example, what may happen if you let people know (verbally or using Twitter or Facebook or whatever) that you have color blindness. At the very least, you will have to suffer inane questions from people such as “What color is my dress?” The best answer to that question is, “The color doesn’t matter. That dress makes you look fat.” You get the idea here.

Be Honest: Know Yourself

The trick is to arrive at a very clear picture in your mind about what your own particular internal characteristics or traits are. Only then can you manage your outward appearance.

Here is one real-life example of the interconnected ways in which your internal characteristics will affect your daily life: If you are shy and have apprehension about going out in public, you should find some way to know that about yourself. This is because a person who does not know that they are shy and have apprehension about going out in public is going to suffer from unhappiness and frustration following a succession of unsatisfactory relationships. If you suffer from unhappiness and frustration, you will not be someone that others will want to be around, and you may end up being a very lonely person.

Here is another example from the real world of the interconnected ways in which your internal characteristics will affect your daily life: If you need to be the center of attention in every interpersonal situation, you should find some way to know that about yourself. This is because a self-centered person like you who does not know that they are self-centered is going to suffer from unhappiness and frustration following a succession of unsatisfactory relationships and being dumped often. If you suffer from unhappiness and frustration, you will not be someone that others want to be around, and you may end up being a very lonely person.

The basic reality of life today in the 21st century is this: Those who know themselves well and who are absolutely honest with themselves about their own internal characteristics or traits will have the best opportunities for success in life.

Emotional Intelligence

Those who are out of touch with who they truly are as a person will have a rough time finding acceptance or success or happiness in life. Your performance in job interviews will also be negative affected. How can you hope to develop your own personal brand if what you develop is based on faulty data?

Therefore, a crucial step in developing your own personal brand is to attain what is known as emotional intelligence. This is sometimes called EQ (for emotional quotient), as compared to IQ (for intelligence quotient.) Simply put, emotional intelligence is a smart awareness of your own and other peoples’ passions along with knowledge of how to control passions. Everyone either has sufficient EQ or not. This is an internal trait that is not necessarily visible out in the world.

So, how does one attain sufficient emotional intelligence? The very annoying answer is this: Some people just are born with this capacity while others will need to make considerable effort to develop it. Others do not care whether they demonstrate this capacity.

But, the truth is developing this EQ capacity is something that you can learn. This capacity is not restricted only to psychiatrists or other medical doctors. You can discover ways to learn this capability, too, even if you have no university degrees at all.

One additional and highly annoying truth is that this capability may not necessarily come to you from book learning. So, did you waste your money on a college education? Some people may be able to develop this capacity from learning lessons in life through interpersonal trial and error.

If you are one of those people who do not care whether you demonstrate sufficient EQ, and, you want to develop your own personal brand, stop reading this right now. Just stop. Go watch reality television instead.

At the core of this whole subject of your internal characteristics is the matter of choice and mental attitude. You can make certain, specific choices about how you present yourself outwardly. But, this will only be possible for you if you first achieve the appropriate mental attitude.

As an example, let’s say that you genuinely feel fearful of new situations in public, and, meeting with people you have never met causes you dread. You must learn to become aware of your specific fears about unfamiliar interpersonal situations and strangers. Once you have become aware of your specific fears in this sense, only then will you be able to construct an appropriate mental attitude to address your specific fears.

You can, for instance, develop the appropriate mental attitude that you are going to go out and meet and interact with people who are strangers and survive those interpersonal situations with dignity and strength and even a few laughs. Unless you first develop that specific mental attitude, you are very likely to suffer emotionally under the strains and pressures of those interpersonal situations in which you are required to meet and interact with people who are strangers.

Reprogramming Your Mind

More psychology for you: How you develop that (or any) appropriate mental attitude is to do what I call “reprogramming” your mind. You may not actually be programming or reprogramming your mind at all. But, let’s agree to call it that for the sake of simplicity.

The point is that you must convince yourself in your own brain that you truly believe something is true before you can behave out in the world with any credible authority.

Even a person who may have developed deep fears of meeting and interacting with strangers can create in their own brain the appropriate mental attitude that will enable them to succeed in what otherwise would be impossibly difficult interpersonal situations.

Is this known as “acting”? Oh, yes it is!

One of the most compelling statements about the power of developing an appropriate mental attitude comes from the great American philosopher, Julius Henry Marx (1890 – 1977): “The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you’ve got it made.”

He was better known as the comedian named “Groucho” starting in the early 20th century, but he was wise and full of insights for the present day.

I also want to share with you an obscure bit of song lyrics. Alan Price, who was born in England in 1942, wrote and sang a song in a movie called O Lucky Man in which his lyrics align with this same mental attitude concept: “Someone’s got to win in the human race. If it isn’t you, then it has to be me. So, smile while you’re making it, laugh while you’re taking it, even if you’re faking it; nobody’s gonna know.”

If you want a persuasive, yet also highly entertaining, lesson about discovering who you are and then developing ways to succeed in this life, rent O Lucky Man. It is a 1973 British film that will occupy only 183 minutes of your life, but you will never forget how it makes you feel.

Your own success in this life is dependent upon the ways in which you use your mind. You cannot accidentally be successful over the course of your life. You must deliberately choose to use your mind to enable success in your life or you should not be surprised when the outcomes do not make you happy.

The Mental Equivalent

Two crucial elements for you if you want to make wise choices about what you are like on the outside are: First, attain a sufficient emotional intelligence. Then, create a clear and specific mental equivalent of what you want the reality outside your mind to be.

You can express your mental equivalent of what you want the reality outside your mind to be by affirming what’s in your mind repeatedly until “it sinks in,” so to speak. One simple and inexpensive tactic to implement this affirmation strategy is to record your own voice saying particular affirmation statements and then play back your affirmations on a portable audio playback device using headphones.

Affirmations must be in the first person, the present (not future) tense, have an active verb, and state something very specific and clear. Here is an example:

“I am drawing positive energy from meeting and interacting with new people every day.”

The reason why you must use “I” and the present tense is to be able to hear you, yourself, telling your brain that the reality you want is available to you right now.

You should record several affirmations and play them back into your own ears privately every day at least once a day. The total running time for your recording should be under 10 or 15 minutes.

Repeated, consistent playback of affirmations into your own ears privately will help you truly believe what your own voice is telling you is true.

I did this exact thing with affirmations, so I vouch for the validity of using affirmations. After I endured a painful separation and divorce in the 1990s, I used affirmations to “reprogram” my mind to reorient myself to an improved life that would specifically replace the life that I was living at the time.

Not only did I end the sadness and loneliness that I was feeling, I also discovered new directions for my life and earning a living. My use of affirmations played back into my own ears privately some 20 years ago.

Even though that was two decades in the past, I can still feel the power of my own voice telling my brain that the reality I wanted was available to me immediately. This is powerful stuff, so be careful how you choose your affirmations and the wording that you use.

As I have proved to myself, the reality is that using your own mind, you can take charge of your life. You can reorient yourself and your life if you only will choose to do so. You can make changes to how your life goes. You can make changes to what you are like on the outside and choose not to reveal to anyone what you are like on the inside.

All of this adds up to the first step of taking control over what you are like on the outside (your outward appearance versus your inner self) so that you can create or fix your personal brand.

It All Starts in Your Mind

How you use your mind affects everything in your life. How you use your mind also directly impacts many people in your life.

“You cannot be healthy; you cannot be happy; you cannot be prosperous; if you have a bad disposition.” Emmet Fox (1886-1951)

Your mental and emotional traits are vital to your survival in life. How well you communicate and whether you can be a leader versus a follower also are directly tied to how you use your mind.

I am one of many who believes that how you use your mind can be changed if you make the decision to change how you use your mind. How you use your mind is not a permanent condition that you were born with. You can choose to change how you use your mind at any age no matter where you live in this world.

How you view other people and how you judge other people are two elements of how you choose to use your mind. If you only believe, trust or value people who believe exactly as you do, then you are choosing not to use your mind correctly.

Believing, trusting or valuing only people who believe exactly as you do is a very clear sign that you have chosen not to use you mind very well. One sign that you are a person who chooses to use your mind well is if you really and honestly can “see the world through other people’s eyes” or “walk a mile in someone else’s shoes” or other similar phrases in the English language.

The ability to know, understand, and feel what other people know, understand, and feel is an ability that comes to people who choose how to use their minds well. Such people are the one who become leaders compared to the rest who are only followers. You cannot accidentally get that job you’re seeking. You cannot accidentally become a success in leadership. You cannot accidentally communicate effectively over the course of your life. These specific successes are available only to people who choose how to use their minds effectively. You can become one of those people if you want to do so.