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)
Constructive Conversation
Over the past few years, I have really struggled to engage in conversation with people. The reason being is that, as part of my personal development, and in order to continually better myself as a person, I have really distanced myself from gossiping. Gossip was something I would do naturally in most interactions with other people, as after all, it makes for spicy and interesting conversation, right? Perhaps, but the truth is that gossip is nothing more than unhealthy and destructive conversation that only reveals one's insecurities and a complete lack of subject matter in which they have anything interesting to talk about themselves. Because gossip was a part of my interactions with others, now that I have restrained from engaging in it, and encouraging it, I find myself a little lost on what to talk with people about. There's only so many times you can ask how someone is, what they've been up to, and what's on their agenda for the near future, before the conversation can hit that awkward dead end. I have always been someone that can converse fluently with anyone who has the ability to converse fluently in return, but if the other person also runs out of things to talk about, it does indeed become a little awkward. It's that moment where you end up doing anything to come up with some valid reason to depart the conversation, just to avoid continuing on the awkwardness of standing there with nothing to say. It's not to say that I don't have plenty to talk about positively in my life, however I would also prefer to listen to other people share some positives about their life. Is it no wonder that so many people struggle to do so though, considering the number of people who are living their life in unhappiness, and even depression? Continual and constructive conversation will continue being a huge focus for me, moving forward, despite how uncomfortable interactions may become, because it's an area I know I can have a massive positive influence on the life of others. I know that gossip is never a form of conversation to resort back to, as it offers no benefit to anyone, only destruction. After all, the saying does go "loose lips sink ships".
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Let Go Of Toxic People
When it comes to personal development, not everything is all inspiring and motivating. That is so, because there are a lot of decisions we need to make, and a lot of actions that we need to take, that can quite often be extremely uncomfortable and challenging. They're not exactly things that we would like to do, yet they have to be done if we are to go on to achieve happiness, success, and prosperity in life. Personal development is indeed about encouragement, motivation, inspiration, drive, focus, progress, goals accomplishment, bettering ourselves, and the like, but there are another two crucial attributes to personal development that are so important for us to master, and they are courage and awareness. We are encouraged to be positive minded, but we cannot simply pretend that the negativity isn't there, and that's where awareness comes into play. We still need to have the awareness of what outlets of negativity surround us, in order to better repel its influence. That's also where courage comes into play, because naturally, many of the outlets of negative influence are people, often individuals to whom we associate with each day, or on a regular basis. Where does the courage part come into it, you may ask? Well, it's the moment we need to eliminate certain individuals from our life, and part ways with them because they are continually influencing us negatively through their beliefs, attitude, and behavior. Much of the time, these individuals are the likes of our partner, our parents, our siblings, our relatives, our friends, and our workmates. These are people we have known for much of our life, and to whom we have a close connection with, and yet they are having a massive negative impact on our life, our future, and our ambitions. The majority of people globally won't admit to being negative minded, yet the proof is in the pudding, courtesy of their actions, thoughts, behavior, attitude, morals, and mannerism. The truth is, the majority of people globally are indeed negative minded, highlighted by the number of people that we talk to each day, or who comment on social media, expressing just how unhappy they are in their life, constantly whinging and complaining in the process.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Family Is Not Always Blood Relative
I am a massive advocate for spending quality time with one's family, and relishing in every moment with them, as family is undoubtedly one of the most precious blessings to have in life. One thing I have really learned in life though, over the past 12 months, is that family is not always blood relative. We can look in the dictionary to see that family is defined as being "all the descendants of a common ancestor", but in reality, to most people worldwide, family isn't defined by definition, it is defined by love. Although I wasn't personally raised as an adopted child, I'm sure many individuals who were indeed adopted, can agree with the fact that the parents who raised them, are considered to be true family, even though they are not blood related. Why? Because it was these certain people who took on board those adopted individuals born into a broken family, or who were given up, or who were abandoned, or whose birth mother was unfortunately incapable of providing a quality life desired for their child, and they accepted the responsibility to love, care, support, raise, educate, and nurture these children into their adult years. Irrespective of color, race, or religion, it took the act of love to bring in an unknown child into their household, raising them as their own, and accepting the responsibility of caring for them, to help them grow, develop, thrive, and succeed in life. That's love as it finest! When we think about family not always being blood relative, we naturally think of adoption as that classic example, but it extends further than this. As I mentioned above, I wasn't raised by adopted parents, but I have begun to see that being blood related doesn't guarantee you the love, support, care, and encouragement that we come to expect from our family. Don't get me wrong, I couldn't have asked for better parents, as they were fantastic in the way they raised me, and I will forever be grateful for everything they ever did for me, and provided me with. I miss them both dearly, and no words can express how much I wish they were both still alive. What I am talking about includes extended family, or anyone else to whom which we are blood related.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Monday Quote Of The Day (Be Fearful Of Mediocrity)
Every single day presents an opportunity for us to start working on designing the life we desire for ourselves, an opportunity for us to start working towards our goals, an opportunity to start working towards creating success for ourselves, an opportunity for us to begin engaging in work we are truly passionate about, an opportunity to begin creating wealth, and an opportunity to start creating a life enriched with happiness. What wonderful rewards and blessings these are to obtain, and yet for most of us, we turn these amazing opportunities down. Happiness, success, lifestyle, work satisfaction, prosperity, and goals accomplishment; six things that we so desperately would love to delight in, yet the majority of us are starved of. What doesn't make sense is that we would love to relish in these rewards, but we actually choose not to. That is correct, WE make the choice not to accept these rewards on offer to us. As much as so many of us love to pass the blame on other people, circumstances, and external reasons, for not being able to receive these rewards into our life, there genuinely is nothing that prevents us from obtaining them, apart from one factor.....ourselves. How does this even make sense, that we could desire these wonderful blessings and rewards so desperately, and yet we choose not to strive for them? We know that the choices and decisions we make in life are determined by the mind. Our thoughts, beliefs, feelings, opinions, and emotions are all generated within our mind, and they are always influenced by what we have heard, what we have seen, what we have experienced, or perhaps what we assume. It's right here where the problem lies for so many of us, as to why we turn away from the amazing opportunities to create such a wonderful and rewarding life for ourselves, that are right in front of us every single day!
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Sunday Quote Of The Day (Take A Job You Love)
For over 21 years, I worked in the corporate world, with about 85% of that being on a full time basis. The first 7 years weren't too bad, as I was generating some great success, whilst progressing nicely up the corporate ladder. By the age of 25 though, I had already had enough. I was sick and tired of the early mornings, I was sick and tired of nasty bosses, I was sick and tired of defending the companies I worked for, for their mistakes, I was sick and tired of being paid such a low income for my time and hard work, and above all, I was sick and tired of the job itself. I got to the stage where I started hating my job. What option did I have though, as after all, I needed an income in order to survive? Like most other people believe, the solution lay within changing jobs, so I did. I moved on to a commission based sales job, which was a massive failure, so I job hopped again. I started working within a financial institution, which was also very unrewarding and unfulfilling, but because I was progressing up the chain again, I stuck with it. In still not finding job satisfaction, I job hopped again, this time to a different financial institution. Once more, I made some great progression up the line, that's until I hit the point where after 14 years of working in jobs that were starting to overwhelm me with unhappiness and dissatisfaction, I entered into a time of depression. I had reached the point where I hated my job so much, that it was having a massive negative impact on my life, and my health. I ended up speaking with a psychologist, in order to help me overcome my depression, and she insisted that I quit my job immediately, as it was having a dire impact on my health. The thought of quitting was extremely enticing, but I knew that I couldn't just cut off my income stream, plus the fact that I didn't want to be a dole bludger, so I went against her advice. After trying to push through another 7 years of suffering, continuing on working full time in a job I seriously despised, I finally saw the light, and I handed in my resignation.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Friday Quote Of The Day (Kick Ass When They Harass)
A couple of decades ago, if I ever heard the word "bullying" being mentioned, I would have automatically thought of the way in which certain kids treat others so horribly at school. I always believed it was just an immature act committed by teenagers and children, and that once people entered into adulthood, they wizened up and put such meanness and nastiness behind them. Oh how I was wrong! Sadly, it seems that so many people never mature at all, or improve their behavior whatsoever. The act of bullying is defined as "seeking to harm, intimidate, or coerce someone", especially those who are perceived as vulnerable. I can certainly remember one time at school when I was bullied, as another fellow student bailed me up in the corner of the classroom and began to belittle and mock me. As far as being bullied since I have left school though, I have actually lost count of the number of times I've had to face this sort of harassment by others. Whilst there have been a couple of instances in which I have been out on the town for a night out with friends, and some bully has decided to confront me and antagonize me into a fight, the majority of bullying has come from people trying to coerce, intimidate, and negatively influence me. Most of this bullying has actually occurred over the past four years, which coincidentally has been the time since I started committing to achieving my goals in life. The worst part to this though is that the biggest culprits who have been bullying and harassing me the most, have actually been those related to me, and those whom I believed to be a friend. Yep, people who claim they love and care about me, have become mere bullies, and unfortunately, they cannot even see any issues with their behavior or actions.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Thursday Quote Of The Day (Be Of Service)
Many people often get confused, when one minute I am encouraging everyone to prioritize helping, supporting, uplifting, encouraging, and giving generously, to others, yet in the next sentence I am stating that people should never go about pleasing others in life. Sounds a little contradictory, right? Surely when we go about helping others, or giving generously to others, we are in fact pleasing them, yeah? Well, there is actually a massive difference between pleasing others and helping others. Let's firstly determine what pleasing others looks like. Many people don't even have the awareness they are actually living their life pleasing others. The truth is, when we are not going about pleasing others, we would be instead going about pleasing ourselves. When pleasing ourselves, our decisions and our actions are based around what is best for us in life, what would be beneficial, advantageous, and perhaps profitable, to us. Our beliefs and opinions would be what we truly believe in our own heart, rather than from what others have told us, or what we have read. We would basically be living our life to our own design, and not to how others advise us to live, or not be influenced or manipulated into living life in any way but how we desire. We would not be following society, or the crowd. It may sound selfish, but it's vital that we are living our life to our own design, because we only get one shot at life, and we want to be living every single one of the days in happiness, success, and satisfaction. When we are happy, satisfied, and successful, we are more likely to become the best version of ourselves that we can be. When we are pleasing others though, that's when we start following what most other people are doing in life, such as finding a job just for income's sake, rather than finding work that we are truly passionate about, or we believe what the majority of other people believe, or we behave in a manner how most other people behave. We do this in order to fit in with society, to avoid being criticized, and labelled as being different and abnormal. We do this in order to avoid confrontation and being made to look foolish. We want to be admired, liked, respected, and accepted, therefore we follow what most others do, and believe what most others believe. The result in doing so though is that we deny ourselves the opportunity to follow our goals, to live life how we desire, and to live life in happiness.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Wednesday Quote Of The Day (You're More Than Capable)
Growing up, one of the things Mum always used to say, when I told her I couldn't do something she asked of me, was "there's no such thing as can't". Truth be told, that there are many things that we simply cannot do in life, as they may be physically impossible, however there are also many things that we simply believe or assume we cannot do, yet they are actually physically possible. Every single one of the tasks that Mum ever gave me to do, in which I said I couldn't do, I ended up doing them, and successfully for that matter. When drilling down to the real reason behind why I always said "I can't do it", we would find that it was nothing more than a case of "I didn't want to do it". Nowadays, I get the "I can't" response from my own daughter. When asking her to tidy up, put away her toys, and place her dirty clothes in the washing basket, I get the good old "I can't", followed by several minutes of her grizzling and groaning, and me constantly telling her to stop being so lazy. How many times she just sits there on the couch, pretending not to hear me, as she continues playing with her toys, before I reach the "angry Daddy voice" stage, I think I have lost count. As a child, we need that discipline to help us with our behavior, our attitude, and our morals, moving into adulthood. We need that constant encouragement, motivation, and push, to highlight to ourselves that we are in fact capable of doing various tasks and actions, especially without the help of our parents, or others. The problem is, what I did as a child, what my own child is doing now, and what undoubtedly many other children worldwide are also doing, in saying they can't do certain tasks or actions, is that there are just as many adults worldwide who do exactly the same thing. When certain tasks and actions are asked of people, or whether it be ones needed to achieve their own goals and dreams in life, they tell themselves they can't do it, that they are not capable of doing it. Again though, let's drill on down further into the reasons behind this lack of belief in their capabilities, and the reason for their "can't".
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Tuesday Quote Of The Day (Willpower Is Essential)
Life is demanding, life is stressful, and life is challenging. I think we all know that much. We surely couldn't be criticized to come home, after another busy and energy sapping day at work, just to completely unwind and relax on the couch in front of the television. By the time we get home in the late afternoon, or early evening, we feel exhausted as it is, but then to cook dinner and clean up afterwards, maybe even get the kids organized and ready for bed also, we feel more than justified to having a couple of hours to ourselves, just to do something more leisurely and enjoyable. There are other options for us, but we tend to turn away from them because they require energy and effort. For example, we could go to the gym perhaps, because we failed to exercise again today, and we know that exercise is vital to our health, but we feel tired as it is, and not to mention, it's too cold to even so much as step outside just to even get to our car. We could perhaps hop on the internet and look at better working options, such as researching about business management, or finding a better job for ourselves, because we immensely hate the job that we are currently at, but it's more enjoyable staying on the couch to scroll through Facebook, after all. Maybe we could even apply ourselves to the actions that are working towards achieving our goals, and the life we desire, for those couple of hours, but it's more relaxing and enjoyable to just stay on the couch and watch our favorite television shows.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Monday Quote Of The Day (The Risk In Not Trying)
We all want assurance and guarantees in life, especially when it comes to our own safety, finances, family, and lifestyle. There's just one problem though, there aren't any real guarantees and assurances in life. Even when we hear about these "money back guarantees" on various products we purchase, or services we accept, there is nothing to suggest that the retailer or seller won't find a loophole in their terms and conditions to decline the guarantee, or they could perhaps go into liquidation, out of the blue. When we head off to work in the morning, we don't even think, for one minute, that we are placing our life at risk, the moment we step out the door. We may be involved in a tragic car accident, we may become a victim of a terrorist attack, we may suffer a heart attack, or we may be the unfortunate one whose life is lost due to an unexpected event. This isn't aimed at filling you with immense fear, to the point you are the frightened to even step out of your house, but the message is that none of us know what the day ahead will deliver. We simply assume that nothing will happen, we feel pretty comfortable that nothing will happen, and we feel pretty positive that nothing will happen, but do we actually have complete assurance and guarantee that nothing will? Of course we don't. No matter what we do in life, we are always at the mercy of something unforeseen and tragic happening to us, even if the potential is extremely unlikely. We don't think of something like this happening to us on any given day because, not only is it highly unlikely, but we haven't experienced or witnessed anything in the past. With this in mind, we step out of house, head off to work, and go about our day as always, without giving as much as a thought to the potential risk we are placing our life in. Why can't we have this same mindset and attitude when it comes to taking risks to enhance our life, and progress towards our goals though?
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Sunday Quote Of The Day (Becoming More Productive)
To be productive is to achieve a significant amount of something, or a result. I suppose we need to ask ourselves the question, how productive are we being in our own individual life? Are we creating significant amounts of something worthwhile and beneficial in our life? Are we generating results? There are five things that spring to mind when I think of generating results in life, them being health, happiness, success, prosperity, and our goals. Now you may wonder why I have included health and happiness in this list of achieving results, and the reason being is that if we are maintaining a healthy, active, and fit lifestyle, coupled with feeling satisfied and fulfilled with our lifestyle, and a constant progression in our life, then that is a definite achievement. That is a great result in itself. Good health can only be achieved from maintaining a balanced diet, rich with plenty of vegetables and fruit, along with ongoing daily exercise. Health is not restricted to just diet and exercise though, we also can't dismiss our mental health, which means we need to be ensuring we are making decisions that are in our best interest and wellbeing, and executing the actions that are working towards helping us find happiness, whilst having the mental strength to ward off the stresses and worries that life constantly delivers. Mental health of course links to happiness, and if we want to achieve that result of long term and ongoing happiness, we indeed need to be making decisions and taking action in working towards creating that happiness and satisfaction in our life. Those decisions we make, and actions we take, in regards to both our health and happiness, they come back to how productive we are, how committed we are to looking after ourselves, and prioritizing these two aspects of our life above everything else.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation
Saturday Quote Of The Day (Fear Of Judgment)
I mentioned yesterday that no matter how much we try to run and hide from change, we will never be able to escape it, as change is something that is both inevitable and unavoidable in life. Change is a natural part of life after all, but there is another aspect of life we can neither run nor hide from also, but unfortunately, this aspect of life has been manufactured by humankind, and that is judgment. As a whole, humankind has become so opinionated, selfish, cold hearted, and arrogant, that the overwhelming majority of people worldwide can't refrain from judging others, and creating their own perception and assessment of others. Just from the way people dress, or look, or act, or behave, or speak, or associate with others, we have developed a terrible habit of categorizing others. We make assumptions about people without really knowing them, or understanding what they are dealing with, or have dealt with, in their lives. It's bad enough to judge others in such a way, but then what's even worse is that we form a negative opinion, dislike, and even hatred, towards others purely because they make decisions, or execute actions, or have certain beliefs, that don't fit our agenda, or that inconvenience us, or that we disagree with. None of us like being inconvenienced obviously, but when we are inconvenienced because someone is purely following their goals and dreams, and creating a future of their own design, that's blessed with happiness, success, and prosperity, and we become angry and frustrated about it, then we have a serious issue. Why should we be opposed to someone chasing their goals, and wanting to create the best future for themselves? Just because they make decisions, or engage in actions, that we wouldn't perhaps do ourselves, or we may disagree with, that's not their problem, it's ours! Everyone has the right to create a future filled with happiness and success for themselves after all, including ourselves. We should never judge people for that, nor stand in their way. In fact, we should be showing support and encouragement towards them, just as we would like from others when it comes to pursuing our own goals.
By David Stidston3 years ago in Motivation