David Stidston
Bio
My name is David Stidston, and I live in the beautiful city of Hobart, in Tasmania, Australia. My aim is to inspire and motivate as many people as possible, to pursue their goals, and create a future blessed with happiness and fulfillment.
Stories (216/0)
Shifting Your Perspective
I talk often about gratitude, and the importance of being able to fully appreciate all the wonderful blessings, assets, people, and abilities in our life currently, rather than constantly focusing on all the things that we don't have. What about gratitude when it comes to our current circumstances though? What if we are currently encountering circumstances that are creating stress, anxiety, worry, suffering, and pain? How are we meant to feel a sense of gratitude when things are going totally against us? It's not an easy thing to do, to go searching for positives in a sea of negativity, but it can be done through a simple shifting of our perspective. First things first, a lot of the time, the circumstances that we find ourselves are not because life is being cruel to us, they are not because other people are making our life difficult, or they are not because we are unlucky in life. In fact, a lot of the time, the circumstances we find ourselves in are as a result of our past decisions and non-decisions. They are a result of our past actions and inactions. That's not to say all the time that adversity is thrown our way, that we are to blame. There are a lot of situations and events that take place outside of our control, and we are left to face suffering and pain, such as the passing of a loved one. Most of the time however, the reason that our circumstances become so uncomfortable, and so painful, are because of the decisions, non-decisions, actions, and inactions, that have led us there. An example of that for me was when I was working in my previous job. I was hating life, I was depressed, and I was even in tears in the rest rooms on many occasions, such had become my distaste for the job. Whose fault was that though? The job description was clear. The company I worked for was clear in their expectations. No one was forcing me to remain there. It's obvious, I was to blame! I hated that job, yet I remained there because I felt I had to stay, in order to make a living for myself. It was my decision to remain there. It was my non-decision in not changing employment. I created those uncomfortable circumstances for myself. So first thing's first, take ownership of the circumstances you're in, by admitting that you made the wrong decision, or you failed to act on changing the situation.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Instant Dismissal
I personally don't like hearing people talk about one of their goals and wishes in life being to live life wealthy, just so they can buy all the luxuries that money can bring, and live the high life. It becomes dangerous territory really, because when we start focusing on all the luxuries and assets that money can buy us, our mind becomes money centric, which can often take the focus away from seeking to help others in life, from serving others in life, and from designing a life blessed with happiness and success. Our purpose in life becomes completely diminished basically. When we start chasing money, our behavior instantly becomes based on greed and selfishness, and we often find that life doesn't reward such behavior. The moment our focus shifts to chasing money, we find that's all we spend our life doing, chasing money. Even if we start creating wealth for ourselves, we are never satisfied, and we are always wanting more, more, and more. We start spending money on things we want, rather than what we need, or to even help those in need. You often hear of people who have inherited a large sum of money, or perhaps who have won a large amount of money on the lottery, that within a few years, they found a way to burn through it all. Their focus became all about living it up, and buying all these non-essential luxuries for themselves, that they completely lost sight of the need for investment, financial wisdom, and generosity. My late mother was a classic example of this. She inherited over 1.5 million dollars from Dad's estate, following his passing back in 2007, yet by the time she passed away herself in mid 2019, her bank accounts were completely empty. To this day, I'm still at a loss as to where she spent all that money, as there are no assets to indicate where those funds were used. I think the issue with so many people is that they believe money and wealth will provide them with happiness, yet history will show that those who have had gained significant wealth, rarely were ever satisfied and happy. Significant wealth and fame couldn't didn't exactly prevent many well known celebrities from taking their own lives. What we should be focusing on in life is working our passion, seeking out our true purpose, generating success, designing a life blessed with happiness and satisfaction, and be helping, supporting, and encouraging others. It's selflessness and hard work that leads to success, and that success will generate the dollars for us anyway.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
I'm Scared!
When we think about fear, we often relate it back to things such as snakes, spiders, heights, enclosed spaces, flying, darkness, storms, needles, and judgment. Despite all of these such things, one of the biggest fears that people have in life is one called decidophobia. Never heard of it? Well this fear doesn't necessarily bring about the same reaction as say how we would react to having a spider on us, or coming into close contact with a snake, and so on, if we had those relative phobias. The reason being is that we can easily escape from this fear, and as it then poses us no threat, then that fear becomes instantly isolated, and we feel that sense of comfort and relief once again. So what exactly is decidophobia? It is simply a fear of making decisions. Sounds a bit weak, hey? How can someone be scared of making decisions, you may ask, right? This could be any decision that one is confronted with, or one that needs to be made, but it more than often revolves around the bigger issues in life. The phobia itself can result in panic attacks, extreme anxiety, and severe stress, but as I mentioned above, because most people find a way to avoid making any decisions that may cause this anxiety, stress, and panic, it's not really a well renowned and discussed issue. The truth is, it is extremely common, proven by people's lack of action, which I will discuss more of in a minute. When we face circumstances in life that continually make us more and more uncomfortable, it's normally life giving us this subtle kick up the bum, telling us that we need to make changes. We are faced with internal decisions in our mind, rather than external decisions that are handed to us to be made. Because they don't have to be made, we feel comfort in the fact that we can therefore avoid them. It could be that we are in a relationship in which our partner is treating us poorly, or they are not being honest, or they are not supporting us, or they are failing to show us love, and so on, but we choose to remain in that relationship, even though we are unhappy and miserable. Why? Because we are too scared to make the decision of parting ways with that person, and ending that relationship. We are fearful of what the future will hold for us without them. We are fearful they may react and respond in an aggressive manner. We are fearful that other people may judge and criticize us for such a decision. We are fearful about having to sort out the equal division of all assets. We have all these such fears and more, running through our head about what may transpire if we made such a decision, that we end up avoiding making the decision altogether. We therefore choose to remain unhappy and miserable rather than have to face up to a tough decision.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Less Talk, More Action!
One of the biggest flaws that humankind has never been able to eliminate, or even just improve on, is inaction. Time and time again, we find ourselves making a statement, adamant that we will do something, and constantly talking the talk, yet all too often, we fail to execute or engage in the actions to support our words. Politicians are a classic example of such behavior. How many times do we hear them make promises that they will do this, and they will do that, in order to support their fellow citizens and enhance their country, and yet they fail to act on those promises? Let's not point the finger at politicians though, because you and I are just as guilty of inaction. I hear so many examples of people who state they will start working towards their goals, and they will commit to scheduling in the time to do so, yet they never do. Question them why, and they will respond with the same old excuses, such as "they haven't had the time", or "they've been too busy", or "now is just not the right time". What happens from here? They never get around to it! They continually allow themselves to get caught up in their everyday life, focusing on tasks and activities that shouldn't even be a priority to them, and yet they wonder why they are not happy and satisfied in life. Then you have those individuals who are always complaining about being overweight. They either tell themselves, or others, that they are going to do better with their diet, and they are going to exercise more regularly and intensely, and yet there they are a few weeks later, lazing on the couch snacking on chips and chocolate. Another common example of inaction comes from tobacco smokers. Time and time again, they tell themselves, and others, that they are going to quit, because they know it's negatively impacting their health, and yet a few weeks, a few months, even a few years later, there they are with another cigarette in their hand, smoking away. Granted that smoking can easily become addiction, it still doesn't excuse us from exercising our willpower. Words are easy! Anyone can say anything they like, but words hold no meaning unless they are supported with action. So, in essence, all we are really doing, is lying. Not only are we lying to others, we are lying to ourselves also. Lying, after all, is a clear indication of a lack of integrity. That's not a good reflection of our character.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
The Choice Is Yours
We should never underestimate the power of the mind. Even though the mind has just the three basic functions, being that of wanting, feeling, and thinking, the impact it has on our life is incomprehensible. Everything from perception, to memory, to attention, to learning, to reasoning, to decision making, to problem solving, to emotion, to understanding, you name it, the mind is extraordinary with what it can do. Like with any part of our body, the mind requires conditioning and training. Unlike the muscles that form in our arms, legs, torso, etc. from regular training and strengthening exercises at the gym, we can't exactly shove a set of weights inside our head and have our mind do some bench presses. Strengthening and training of the mind revolves around control, awareness, and focus. The difference though with strengthening of the mind, in comparison to the strengthening of other areas of our body, is that we cannot visually see our mind grow from the training and conditioning it receives. A typical common human flaw is that when we don't visually see something, we don't often value it, care for it, or believe in it. It's just like the journey towards success, that if we don't see positive results being manifested, then we start believing that the success won't eventuate, hence why so many of us give up. We want to see some sort of visual results, just so we can feel comforted that we are making progress. The reality is, if we are progressing towards success, no matter how slow it may be, and no matter how many failures, setbacks, rejections, and challenges we encounter, we are still moving forward towards success. Often, results don't visually appear as we hope or anticipate, but it doesn't mean we are not progressing. Because we don't see the mind, like we do the muscles in our body, most of us completely undervalue the importance of mindset training, and instead focus completely on physical training instead, as we can visually see those muscles begin to build and develop. Whilst there is absolutely nothing wrong with physical training, and we should all be doing more of it, we should also be doing way more mindset training, because a weak mind only leads to a weak future.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
What's In It For Me?
Is it a good thing or a bad thing to be selfish in life? Selfishness is certainly a characteristic that most of us fail to master, that's for sure. In answering that question though, we absolutely need to be selfish in regards to many aspects of our life, but we also need to understand that part of our purpose in life is to help, uplift, and support others, therefore we also need to be selfless. So that begs another question, how do we get the balance right? Let's firstly look in what areas of life we have every right to be selfish in. The easiest way to distinguish where it's acceptable to be selfish is to firstly be clear on what our main priorities are in life, which should always be our happiness, our health, our goals, and our family. Family is a given, because we naturally want the best for them, and we will always do for them what we believe is in their best interest. We are always wanting to ensure that we are providing them with food, shelter, love, care, support, and the best life they can possibly have. As strange as it may sound though, family shouldn't be our number one priority in life though, nor even number two or three. They are indeed a very high priority, but there are another three priorities that we should actually place above them, and it's in these three aspects of life where we need to be more selfish. I'll explain why. Firstly, those three priorities are our happiness, our health, and our goals. Now, of course we would love to ensure our family is happy, but at the end of the day, we are all granted just the one life to live, and I think we all know just exactly how much effort and hard work it takes just to make ourselves happy, let alone other people. The truth is, everyone is personally responsible for their own happiness, but too many people make the mistake of placing their own happiness in the hands of others. They hope that by entering into a relationship with someone, or marrying someone, that their partner will be responsible for bringing them happiness in life, but much to what many people believe, that's not the true role of a partner. A partner is there to love, to care, to support, to encourage, to be loyal, and to be faithful to us, not to make us happy. Happiness comes from within ourselves and our mindset. When it comes to a relationship, effective and honest communication, compromise, and commitment will ultimately help contribute to our happiness, but it won't make it. Happiness is our own responsibility! So many relationships break down because too many people place their happiness in the hands of their partner, and when they don't get that happiness, they want out. That's not love! In fact, that is selfishness in a bad light, blended with a lack of commitment to enhancing the relationship. Create your happiness, and go after your goals, then if your partner is true to you, they will support you in your decisions, but it's never their job to make you happy. Hopefully you both have a vision in which you both want to work towards, and that's when love works at its finest. If you are placing your faith in a partner to bring happiness in your life, be prepared for disappointment and heartbreak, because most people will look after themselves first and foremost, and they likely won't sacrifice their own happiness just so you can have yours!
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Added Fuel
When journeying towards our goals, there are several factors that have the potential to distract us from focusing on achieving them, along the way. To first start the pursuit, we need that element of motivation within us, that enticement of actually achieving our goal, as we visualize the feelings and emotions that we would experience in that moment of success. Picturing such a moment fills us with great joy and excitement, which ultimately is what triggers the motivation within us to get started on the journey. Sadly, motivation is a very unreliable emotion. It can be easily distracted by external influences and circumstances. Ask anyone who has ever quit such a journey, and they will tell you that they lost all motivation to keep persevering with trying to achieve their goals, because they became sick and tired of continually failing over and over again, they became sick and tired of being rejected, they became sick and tired of waiting for success to manifest, and they became sick and tired of constantly facing challenges and setbacks. To these individuals, success was clearly never going to present itself when there were constant failures, rejections, setbacks, and challenges, hence the reason for giving up on their goals. That's what they believed anyway! Anyone who has ever succeeded will tell you that you simply just need to keep on persevering, no matter the time it takes, no matter the number of failures, no matter the number of setbacks, no matter the number of rejections, and no matter the number of challenges. The journey is about patience, determination, resilience, perseverance, belief, and hard work. We are all human though, and we all experience the disappointment, frustration, pain, suffering, and hurt that comes with failure, rejection, setbacks, and other adversities. We know the option to give up is so much easier to do, rather than continue on encountering the emotions of disappointment, and the like. It's the time where our motivation gets immensely tested. But if choose to quit, what do we achieve? All that pain, suffering, and hard work all amount to nothing, therefore, we need to refuel our motivation.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Life's Way Of Telling Us
Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you have reached breaking point, as a result of circumstances just continuing to get worse and worse? Perhaps the relationship with your partner has become unhealthy and unhappy, void of love, trust, support, and intimacy? Maybe your job continues to become more and more stressful, demanding, and unsatisfying, to the point you have begun to feel overwhelmed, and even depressed? Maybe there is a certain individual in your life who is constantly harassing you, criticizing you, belittling you, bullying you, and dragging you down, which is taking its toll on you mentally and emotionally? Perhaps you are constantly struggling financially, to the point where you have become extremely anxious about being able to make your bill and mortgage/rent payments on time? Maybe you have even reached the point where you are so sick and tired of looking in the mirror, gazing upon yourself in shame at the excess weight you carry, courtesy of a poor routine you have developed in overindulging in junk food, combined with a continual failure to exercise? These examples, and many other circumstances, we commonly find ourselves in, and we identify pretty early on in the picture, that things are simply not right, and definitely not how we desire. Sadly, what is also common, is that we fail to take action in fixing them when we do identify them. Instead, we just let them slide, hoping that these circumstances will eventually just sort themselves out. Not surprisingly, they don't, not until action of sorts is taken anyway. By the time we reach breaking point, we are so distressed, so unhappy, so mentally exhausted, and even so depressed, that we have taken our life into a deep, dark trough!
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Can't Be Bothered
Living in such a fast paced and demanding world, it's no wonder that we so often feel tired, exhausted, and lethargic. Life is just all go, go, go, that when any precious moment of peace and relaxation actually presents itself, we are very quick to take advantage of it. When that rare sleep in opportunity comes around, we take it. When that opportunity to just relax on the couch and watch Netflix or television comes around, we take it. When that opportunity comes around, to just sit down and rest for a few minutes, giving us some time to browse through social media on our phone, we take it. When that opportunity of being invited out for a coffee, or a night out with friends, comes around, we take it. After all, is there any problem with just relaxing for a while, or watching a bit of television, or catching up on some sleep, or spending time with our friends? Unwinding and resting for a few moments is actually a good thing, especially if we can use that time for some quiet meditation perhaps, or maybe to catch up on some of that much needed sleep that we too often deprive ourselves of. The problem is when we start to abuse this time, and make it habitual. We allow it to start eating into the time we need to be productive, and be getting stuck into the actions that are working towards our goals. Scaling it back even further though, it goes back to what I was talking about yesterday, in how we spend excessive time focusing on the less important aspects of life, rather than on our priorities. We lack balance in our life. We find ourselves spending an excessive amount of time at work, at our job, because we are so fixed in our focus on earning a living, that we totally forget to actually make a life for ourselves. The time we spend at our job, further compounded by the amount of time we spend commuting to and from work, many of us actually are losing 12 of the 24 hours that we have in the day. All of a sudden, we then feel pressured to try and cram other tasks and activities into the remainder of our day, such as making meals, spending time with our family, and staying on top of the maintenance and cleaning of the house we live in. We find ourselves sacrificing sleep in order to keep our head above water, which becomes detrimental to our health, and that's why we ultimately find ourselves feeling tired, exhausted, and lethargic all the time. It's no wonder we take advantage of any moment of peace and quiet to ourselves. But where's the time for our goals, and working on designing the life we desire?
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
The Life That You Desire, And The Goals That You Dream Of
Are you disappointed with the life you are living at the moment? Unhappy in your relationship? Hating your job? Stressed about your financial situation? Unsatisfied with the way you look and feel? Disappointed with your overall lifestyle? Don't worry if you answered yes to any, or all, of these questions, because you would actually be far from the only person to be feeling this disappointment, dissatisfaction, and unhappiness. You only need to look at social media to see the number of people who have nothing else better to do in their life but whinge and complain about something, be it about their life itself, or something else. You only need to go as far as your workplace to see the number of people who are constantly whinging and complaining about their job, their boss, the company they work for, the customers, their fellow workmates, or their life in general also. In fact, you probably may not even need to leave your home at all, to gauge the unhappiness, dissatisfaction, and disappointment that people are feeling in their life right now, as it may be your own partner, parents, children, or housemates who are constantly moody, and always whinging and complaining. There are always those individuals who love to keep up appearances, and pretend that their life is all lollipops and rainbows, when deep down, they are feeling unhappy, miserable, unsatisfied, and even depressed. Being someone who has, and still is, battling depression, I hate appearing in public as being depressed and unhappy, so I've always concealed these feelings. At my former job, I even had customers commenting about how unbelievably happy and jovial I was all the time, and how they believed I truly loved my job, when in reality, I hated my life and my job with a passion. Don't be fooled into thinking that people are loving their life, and that nothing is wrong in their life, because the majority of people who actually say this, and display this sense of great happiness, are actually bluffing. That's why it's crucial that we always treat others with care and respect, because we don't truly know what is going on in their life. The fact of the matter is, most people are unhappy and unsatisfied with their life, and there is one major reason for this. Most people aren't living the life they desire, nor are they close to achieving their goals.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Every Pain Is An Opportunity
So you're going through a tough time in your life? It feels like your world is totally falling apart around you. You've lost your job, or you're experiencing some massive financial hardship, or you're marriage/relationship has just ended, or your house burnt down, or a loved one has just passed away, or anything to these levels of complete devastation, disbelief, and sadness. You are feeling at your lowest of lows, and you really need strong support and love around you. Feeling the way you do, the last thing you would really want to hear from anyone is for them to tell you to stay strong, because every pain is an opportunity, and every pain is a gift. How could the passing of a loved one be a gift? How could losing your job be a gift? How could your house being burned down be an opportunity? How could being financially crippled be an opportunity? Times of adversity are unpleasant, there's no sugar coating that! When things are going against us, it's incredibly difficult to try and remain positive, even more so, to be seeking out opportunities. As strange as it may be though, life does indeed present opportunities to us, during times of adversity and suffering. We may not see it at the time, but often, we can end up being led to a place of happiness, success, and satisfaction. That pain and suffering that we endure can end up becoming our superpower. I think it's when we are on the other side of such pain and suffering, we slowly begin to see the courage, resilience, and strength we actually applied to get through such a tough time. It's an achievement in itself, and something we should be proud of, because pain, suffering, and adversity can be incredibly demoralizing and damaging to our mental state. For some people, such times can become so overwhelming, that they fail to overcome it, either wasting away in misery, or sadly, even taking their own lives.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Just One Believer
In nearly four years of journeying towards my goals now, I have seriously lost count of both, the number of people that have tried to bully and harass me into following their advice instead of my own heart, and the number of times they have done so. It's sad that these very people have been my very own family, friends, and loved ones, people who I always believed would be there to support me, yet many of whom I have since distanced myself from now, as a result of their lack of support and encouragement toward me. It's unfortunate that the majority of people worldwide have the misconception that failure, especially continual failure, is a sure sign that one should give up on their conquest. Bar a miniscule percentage of people, anyone who has ever achieved success will tell you how many times over they failed, they were rejected, and/or they faced adversities, before they finally reached their goal. Failure is a natural part of the journey to success, stepping stones along the pathway basically, as too is patience. Life transforming goals normally take years to achieve, that's just the way life goes. Life seems to delight in testing and challenging us, but it does so to help us learn, grow, develop, and mature. We all know that failure, rejection, and adversity is never enjoyable or pleasant to encounter, deal with, or overcome. There's a natural feeling of disappointment, sadness, and incapability. It's easy to beat ourselves up about it, and feel completely discouraged, even to the point we feel like giving up, but we will never achieve anything great, the moment we adopt a defeatist attitude. That's where we need to stand firm in our self-belief, because in order to achieve, you first must believe. Once that belief is lost, so becomes the goal! The problem that we have is that most other people don't truly give a stuff about our goals, because they are too focused on creating happiness and satisfaction in their own life. Either that, or they just want us to do what is convenient to them, or what suits their agenda. Now it's fair enough that we are each personally responsible for creating our destiny, but wouldn't it be nice to have some sort of support, encouragement, and upliftment along the journey towards achieving what we desire, just to keep us in the right headspace?
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation