Without firmly planted roots and strong trunk, the life-giving potential of the water would be dispersed, misguided, and lost in a splash of confusion. Our individual growth is no different. The wisdom of our teachers — the inspirational leaders, fearless explorers, and great writers who inspire and motivate — will only help us grow if we choose to digest their wisdom through our core, channeling and guiding their wisdom through our essence.

When we grow and reach for the stars, we need to grow and reach from that place deep inside, that place where the very essence of our existence illuminates the path ahead. Real growth does not originate from grabbing wisdom and slapping on inspiration but rather through digesting, filtering, and absorbing the nutrients of wisdom through our heart.

“I have no idea why you would be talking to a drunk guy with pink sunglasses at the bar, but anyway what was he afraid of? What was he planning for?”

“He just came up to me and started talking. He said there’s a revolution coming and the whole world is going to change. He’s getting ready and planning for the worst. I wasn’t really taking this guy seriously, but I’ve heard a lot of people talking about a revolution. Rumors mostly, but lots of people seem to think something is going to happen.”

“Yeah, there’s a lot of messed up stuff going on and something needs to change. I don’t know. A revolution might happen but I don’t think people are going to be on the streets with guns shooting and robbing each other.”

I overheard this conversation between to guys sitting at the table next to me in a coffee shop in Boston. It got me thinking: How many other people might be “talking about a revolution coming”?

And if lots of people were talking, why wasn’t anything happening? If so many people knew “there’s lots of messed up stuff going on and something needs to change”, why wasn’t more being done to change it?

A revolution doesn’t start with rumors or whispers or conversations in a coffee shop. It doesn’t start by chatting about the way that other people might start a revolution. It doesn’t start by vacillating between what is, what was, and what could be. It doesn’t start by perpetuating fear, puttering about, and passing time.

No. The revolution starts when you decide you’ve had enough. It starts when you stand up and choose to become your own beacon of hope. It starts when you resolve not to give in to negative influence, laziness, and complacency. It starts when you stop waiting for it to start.

Your small acts of resistance — your stubborn defiance against your inner pessimist and your refusal to accept from the world anything less than what you believe is right — that will start the revolution. That will create the momentum that’s needed.

You can be a bystander. You can watch from the sidelines as the world around you changes in response to the actions of a few. You can complain, criticize, and condemn all the negative things that are happening. You can feel powerless to make a difference. You can sit back and watch life pass you by like a movie, waiting only for the end to arrive before you stand up.

Or you can stand up right now and take matters into your own hands. You can throw the status quo overboard and become a leader and a trendsetter. You can become an innovator and an instigator. A fire starter. A changemaker. A revolutionary. You can stop being afraid and become the person you wish you saw in everybody else.

You can refuse to accept things as they are and do what’s necessary to start changing them. You can empower yourself by any and all means. You can take charge. You can refuse mediocrity and rectify injustice. You can stand tall, keep your head up, and hold onto your beliefs.

Ask yourself what you would die for so that you may know the reason you’re living.

Identify what your revolution needs and start working towards creating it. Set high goals and march in their direction with relentless dedication and commitment.

Anything your life may need to support your revolution is yours to be had. Expertise, influence, health, wealth, knowledge, experience. The only limits are the ones that you set for yourself. Nothing is out of reach.

The revolution starts when you choose to become a revolutionary.

Imagine a city where every resident was someone who had changed the world in a big way — Mahatma Gandhi, Albert Einstein, Alexander the Great, Mother Theresa, The Wright Brothers, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Edison, and any other famous person who has ever changed the course of history.

Now imagine you’re strolling around that city and watching all those great people walk around, except that none of them know who they are; none of them realize the impact they’re going to have on the future of the planet.

Right now this world is full of people like that. People who are powerhouses of potential. People with an incredible capacity for greatness but who walk around seemingly unaware of that fact, unaware that they have the power to become passionate leaders, creative innovators, magical healers, and moving motivators.

People like you and me.

Do you think Einstein was thinking about the impact he would have on science when he was coming up with the theory of relativity? Do you think Mahatma Gandhi or Mother Theresa woke up every morning and thought about how much people would talk about them after they were gone?

They believed in what they were doing and they refused to give up. They refused to back down in the face of adversary and they resolved to continue if not even a single person joined them. They weren’t concerned with changing the world. They were only concerned with being the change itself.

Every human that has ever lived was just that: human. They were no different than you or me. Their potential wasn’t any greater than ours. In fact, with so much knowledge and technology at our disposal, we have more potential today than any famous person who has ever lived on Earth.

The world is full of potential changemakers. They’re everywhere. Almost seven billion of us at last count. For those of us who take advantage of the opportunity that’s available to us, the world will change in response to our actions.

We may only be able to change our small world. The history books might not remember our names. The only thing we might be able to change is ourselves. We might only leave a positive impact on the lives of those around us. What’s important to remember though is that’s enough.

Each of us is like a tiny raindrop. We might only make a little ripple in the sea of time, but collectively our ripples become waves of change. The size of the ripple isn’t important, but it must be consistent. It must be relentless.

All great changemakers recognized that they could only do so much, but that what they could do should be done with great passion, dedication, and fearlessness.

You don’t need to be a genius. You don’t need to be born into royalty. You don’t need to be surrounded with perfect circumstances. The power to make a difference — the power to be powerful — is in your hands. The only person holding you back is you.

Live your life the way you’d like to see the waves build. Initiate movement. Lead the flow. Shake the system. Challenge the status quo. Make a ripple. Make a ruckus. It’s up to you now.

In the past six months I have lived in four countries and called more than twenty-six places home. I’ve traveled more than twenty-five thousand miles using cars, buses, jeeps, trains, airplanes, rickshaws, taxis, motorcycles, and my own two feet.

I’ve gotten lost walking at night in Bombay. I’ve watched thousands of giant bats descend on the great city of Udaipur. I’ve walked through clouds, surrounded by fields of corn and I’ve climbed ten-thousand feet into the Himalayan mountains, covered in sweat, sand, and sunburns.

Sitting down to write a summary of the most incredible six months of my life, I found myself faced with the task of telling a story of epic proportions, one that felt on par with the Lord of the Rings and The Odyssey. I considered limiting it to the story of my inner journey, but then I realized that was even more grand than the physical one.

As I reminisced and pondered what to write, my journey reminded me of these words by the Greek poet Constantine Cavafy, written almost exactly one-hundred years ago:

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the angry Poseidon — do not fear them:
You will never find such as these on your path,
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your spirit and your body.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the fierce Poseidon you will never encounter,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your soul does not set them up before you.

Pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you will enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.

Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.

Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would have never set out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what Ithacas mean.

Constantine P. Cavafy (1911)

I like to think of my Ithaca as that moment before I die where I look at back on life with a feeling of contentment; that moment where I say to myself with confidence that I was happy for everything I had done, everyone I had met, and all the people whose lives I helped change along the way.

That’s my Ithaca. The journey between this moment and Ithaca is pure opportunity, pure potential, pure life. I might be lowering my sails and preparing to set anchor in a familiar cove for a few months, but the journey itself is far from over.

This journey began when I decided it was too important to postpone and although the journey may have been epic, there wasn’t anything extraordinary about its beginnings — this journey simply became the most important thing in my life.

Are you postponing something that your gut is telling you would be epic? Have you been putting something off that you know deep down inside needs to be done?

The journey will only begin when you decide it’s too important to continue putting off. There will be people — Cyclops and Lestrygonians — who try to deter, distract, and discourage you. Pay them no attention. There will be seemingly insurmountable challenges that you need to face. Do not feel intimidated.

This is your journey and your great voyage through the sea of life. You choose who to share your journey with and what stops to make along the way. You choose when to raise the sail and when to set anchor. You choose what Ithaca means.

All the little things we do throughout the day may seem insignificant, but they add up to big changes. Here are twenty-one ways that you can start improving your health today and create a healthier, more pain-free you for tomorrow.

1. Walk frequently. If your job has you sitting down all day, get up and walk around as often as you can without being fired. If you spend most of your day at a desk or driving in your car, form a morning, evening, or lunchtime routine of walking for at least twenty minutes.
2. Take the stairs. Do you work on the second floor of a building? What about the eighth floor? Take the stairs, every single day. When I started my last job, taking the stairs to the eighth floor the first time had me gasping for air. Fast-forward one year and I was running those stairs and beating my elevator-riding co-workers to the office! Stairs are an excellent way to seamlessly add exercise to your day without even going near a gym.
3. Drink water. You’ve heard it before, but this doesn’t get old. Water is magical. To stay healthy you need to drink plenty of water throughout the day. Try replacing unhealthy drinks with a glass of water when you’re feeling thirsty. Carry a bottle of water with you wherever you go so you never have an excuse to skip it!
4. Eat breakfast. Yes, breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. Even if you’re not hungry, you should be trying to eat something. Don’t have any healthy food in the house? Eat anything! Breakfast is the one meal of the day where it’s better to eat unhealthy than not at all. However, a nice bowl of oatmeal with blueberries, raisins, and bananas would be ideal. Grab an apple or orange on the way to work for a mid-morning snack.
5. Get some sun. The sun has all kinds of healing properties. Yes, it can cause skin cancer, but I’m not telling you to go outside naked and bake in the sun for eight hours. Just go outside and grab a few extra rays during your lunch break. Spend the weekend in the yard or hiking a forest trail.
6. Stretch every day. Your muscles are like elastic bands. The less they’re stretched, the tighter and more ridged they become. Stretching causing your blood to flow and carry nutrients to various areas of your body. Think of the positions your body is normally in and stretch in the opposite direction. If you sit down a lot, stand up and stretch your hands overhead. When you get out of bed, spend at least two minutes stretching before you head to the shower. You don’t need a yoga routine. Just do whatever stretch feels good.
7. Eat whole foods. This seems to go without saying, but it’s absolutely vital to our health. Whole foods are healthy. When we eat them, they make our body healthy. It’s really that simple. Whole foods are basically anything that hasn’t been processed or manufactured by a machine: Fruits, nuts, vegetables, grains. Try forming a habit of eating one apple every day. Keep a bag of nuts in the car and snack on those during the drive home.
8. Be conscious of your posture. Everyone has a different posture, but there is a such thing as “proper posture”. Take a moment to evaluate your posture. Are you slouching over? Are you walking with your head down? Imagine someone tying a string to the top of your head and then pulling on it (no, you’re not being hanged). Do that with your posture: pull your shoulders back, push your chest out, stretch your neck up, and breathe. Try to be aware of your posture throughout the day and correct it once you recognize that it’s out of balance.
9. Modify your eating habits. We all need to eat. By the time you’re an adult, eating has become a habit — it’s second nature. However, small adjustments to our daily eating habits can have huge long-term affects on our health. Do you normally eat a poptart for breakfast? Try cereal with fresh blueberries and bananas instead. Do you normally have coffee with two creams and four sugars? Try coffee with one cream and two sugars. Slowly move your eating habits in a direction that is healthier and before you know it, you’ll be eating and feeling a lot more healthy.
10. Meditate. This doesn’t mean you need to become a monk and dedicate the rest of your life to a spiritual calling. Collect your thoughts. Spend a few minutes quieting your mind and bringing it back home. Take deep breaths and relax your entire body. You can try it in the morning (before stretching) or just before bed. Even during your lunch break is a good time. At my last job, there was a small quiet area with a patch of grass underneath a tree. I would spend a good ten to fifteen minutes there after lunch collecting my thoughts and meditating.
11. Avoid feeling “stuffed”. The goal of eating shouldn’t be to feel stuffed. It’s an uncomfortable feeling and it’s detrimental to our health. If you normally feel stuffed after your meals, try eating slightly smaller portions. It’s OK to feel slightly hungry after a meal. You’re not going to die. Worst case, you’ll feel a little hungry between that meal and your next meal! Science has shown that there are many benefits to eating fewer calories, so try not to stuff yourself — you’re not about to experience a famine!
12. Treat physical inconveniences as mini-workouts. If you have to move a heavy box to another room, pretend it’s a mini workout session. If you couldn’t find a close parking spot and have to walk further than usual, treat it as a mini cardio session. Many physical inconveniences can be treated as opportunities to improve our health. Instead of complaining, think about how it’s making you stronger and healthier!
13. Get enough sleep. Our bodies need sleep to recharge and regenerate. If you’re skipping out on sleep, your body will naturally be more stressed than it needs to be. Stress causes aging and releases chemicals into your body that are harmful. Everyone has different sleep requirements, but you will know if you’re getting enough sleep. Go to bed a little earlier than usual if you need to. Try not drink caffeine at least five or six hours before bed. Also, eating a big meal or watching TV can prevent you from falling asleep. Regular exercise will also ensure that you fall asleep early!
14. Walk barefoot. Your feet contain many nerves with pressure points linked to various parts of your body. Walking barefoot stimulates these and increases the blood flow throughout your body. If you normally spend all day in shoes, try walking barefoot. If possible, walk around at work with only your socks on (make sure you feet aren’t smelly). The next time you bring the trash outside, try going barefoot. Take your time though and be careful. Your feet may be extra sensitive from living a life of comfort in those shoes!
15. Try something you’ve never done before. Our bodies and brains require stimulation to remain healthy. If you repeat the same routine every day, or do the same set of activities on the weekend, you’re severely limiting your growth. Join a martial arts class. Take a yoga class. Try trail running. Rent a mountain bike and discover the forest trails from a new perspective. Listen to a new genre of music. Read a different type of book. Explore that street you pass every day but have no idea where it leads.
16. Move frequently. Objects in motion remain in motion. If you want to be healthy, you need to be in motion, whether that means physical motion or mental motion. Try to be as active as possible (again, mentally or physically). Try not to sit in one spot for more than thirty minutes to an hour. Get up, walk around, stretch, squat, jump, whatever. Think of activity as life and inactivity as death in progress (once again, physically or mentally).
17. Do something relaxing. Set aside time to relax as frequently as possible. This could mean anything: spending quality time with family, reading a book by the ocean, going for a weekend camping trip, or just siting outside enjoying the moment. You should make time to relax every day, but even an entire week’s worth of stress can be released in a few hours on the weekend by doing something that you find very relaxing.
18. Breathe deeply. A deep breath provides ample oxygen to your body, calms your muscles, and releases stress. This is something you can do anywhere and at anytime. As you go throughout your day, try taking a deep breath whenever you feel even the slightest indication of stress. Battle the stress with air!
19. Laugh often. Like deep breathing, laughter is an excellent stress-buster. Science has even shown that laughter has the potential to physically heal our bodies. It’s the purest expression of joy and happiness. Even if you have no one to laugh with, try laughing to yourself. It feels great!
20. Watch children play. Spending time watching children play reminds us what it’s like to live without worry and stress; to live carefree and content with the moment. We all have an inner child who never dies and watching other children play makes our inner child come out from hiding. This helps us rediscover the joy and beauty of the moment.
21. Think long-term. The reason we want to be healthy is so that we can enjoy life without discomfort and pain. If we think short-term, we won’t see the value in improving our health today. Ask yourself what the you of tomorrow, or next year, will think about the you of today. Will that person look back with pride and admiration for the effort you spent improving your health? The future starts with today.

There are lots of ways to improve our daily health, but just reading about them isn’t going to do much good. Choose any number of these steps, whether it’s just one or all twenty-one of them, and try to integrate them into your daily life.

Do you have any other tips for improving our daily health? Share them in the comments below!

From the moment you wake up until the moment you sleep, you’re creating art.

Brushing your teeth? Art. Putting on makeup? Art. Getting dressed? Art. Eating breakfast? Art. Kissing a loved one? Art. Driving to work? Art. Doing your work? Absolutely art.

Speaking to a friend? Art. Walking to lunch? Art. Reading email? Art. Writing email? Art. Browsing the web? Art. Daydreaming? Art. Brainstorming? Art.

Every single thing you do is art.

You cannot escape it. Whether you choose to believe it or not is irrelevant. The very fact that you’re human makes you an artist. You have the gift of conscious awareness, the gift of choice, the gift of creativity.

You can spend your entire life denying you’re an artist or you can whip out your paintbrush and start acting like Michelangelo.

Nobody is going to push you to make this choice, but nobody is going to stop you either. It’s entirely up to you.

If you’re feeling incapable of greatness; if you’re feeling unsure of yourself; if you doubt your potential; the paintbrush and the canvas don’t give a damn. They have all the time in the world and they’re not going anywhere.

On the other hand, your paint — your life — is drying out.

You’re an artist. Life is your canvas. One way or another, you’ll be creating your masterpiece until the day you die.

What are you doing with your canvas? Are you gawking at the work of other artists and watching your paint dry or are you painting your life with diligent exuberance and radiant passion?

If so, the first thing you’ll need to do is stop being like everybody else and start focusing on what makes you, you. If you try to be like everybody, you’ll end up being nobody.

We are all unique; each and every one of us has a history that is uniquely different from everyone else. None of us have the exact same past. The combination of things you’ve experienced, people you’ve met, choices you’ve made, and tough situations you’ve been through are one hundred percent unique to you.

Your history — your past experiences, successes, and mistakes — make you uniquely capable of handling specific situations and solving specific problems in the world. You are so unique in fact, that the only path in life for you to take is your path.

By doing what everyone else is doing, by following the crowd or choosing to follow the path of someone else, you’re not going to change the world; you’re not going to make a difference; and you’re not going to be happy.

Step out of that box that you, your family, your friends, and society have created around your life. You’re a powerful human being, with incredible abilities and superior skills. Why are you letting those go to waste? You are your own master. You are your own God. When it comes to living your life, nobody else even comes close to competing.

Everything you need to be, you are. You don’t have to change or try to be something or someone different. Life provides you with all that is needed to succeed and make a difference. Anything you don’t already have will be provided along the way. All you have to do is step out of the way, stop trying to follow the goals and dreams of someone else, and take the initiative to be yourself.

Stop trying so hard and just be.

Follow your heart and intuition and they will guide you. If it feels like they’re guiding you towards mistakes, then those mistakes are probably vital to your growth and progress. The right path in life isn’t always obvious or easy.

When life throws you lemons, make lemonade. When life throws you a truck-load of lemons, start a lemonade business. But please, don’t give up and let those delicious lemons rot away!

Embrace yourself. Right now. It’s OK, no one is watching. Close your eyes and try it. Wrap your arms around yourself and give yourself a big hug.

That person loves you more than anyone else ever could. That person will be there with you forever, even on your death bed. Such dedication deserves a little appreciation and love in return, don’t you think?

There are so many people in the world right now who would benefit from what you’ve learned in life. You have the ability to make a permanent impact on their life. These people need you to stop ignoring yourself.

Allow yourself to be yourself. Find the courage to be yourself. Learn to love and take care of yourself before anyone else. Let your unique beauty shine through and touch the hearts and souls of those around you. Genuinely care. Be compassionate and respectful to all life.

Do this and I can promise that you will not only make a difference in your world, but also in the world of those around you.

Suddenly, I realize that I now have the freedom to go to those places. I no longer have to dream about them like everybody else.

It was an exhilarating feeling of absolute adventure — sort of like what you feel on day one of a two-week vacation, only amplified to encompass an entire lifetime.

I’m writing this post from a WiFi lounge in London’s Heathrow airport, waiting for my connecting flight to Bangalore, India. A few short months ago, I never could have imagined myself being here in London.

Now here I am, sitting among dozens of fellow travelers — some traveling for work, some for pleasure, and perhaps even some nomadic travelers like myself, headed to an unfamiliar place on a mission to rediscover themselves.

The twenty-three hour journey to India is giving me plenty of time to think about the impact this lifestyle change is going to have on my life. Every time I look around the airport and realize that I’m not traveling for work or vacation like most of the people around me, I get this twisted feeling in my stomach when I realize that this freedom is my life now.

The entire world is knocking at my door and nothing can stop me from greeting it.

I’m living the dream I’ve had since I was thirteen.

I’m a world traveling, nomadic explorer!

When you’ve got a calling — when every ounce of your existence is telling you to do something — there comes a point where you can no longer ignore it. I reached that point where I simply couldn’t put this off any longer. Holding it back — holding it all inside — was beginning to destroy me. It felt as though my entire life was being slowly extinguished.

But the transition up to this point wasn’t easy.

I left a secure job with great coworkers, got rid of my only means of transportation, and reduced my physical possessions further than I thought possible. With no travel experience outside the United States, I’m now on my way to the opposite side of the planet toting just a single backpack and the clothes on my back.

The most difficult part of this transition, however, has been the emotional impact its had on those I love. Nobody likes to intentionally inflict pain on others — even if it’s indirect and will result in your own eventual happiness. It still feels wrong.

When I have tough decisions to make — when I’m feeling certain conflicts inside — I don’t resort to emotional decisions. I rely on what my morals and my instincts tell me is right and wrong. Sometimes things work out for the better. Sometimes they don’t. But whatever happens, I always know that my actions were based on decisions that were made by being true to myself; by being honest with myself.

Being honest and true to myself is very important to me.

What good are we as human beings if we cannot even be honest and true to ourselves? If we cannot even trust our own instinct or listen to our inner calling, what right do we have to exist?

There’s only one person who’s going to change your life for the better. There’s only one person who is really going to make you happy. There’s only one person who will make you free.

That person is you.

You cannot rely or depend on anyone but yourself. You have to trust yourself to handle any situation that gets thrown at you. You will handle it. You might make the wrong choices and you might fail miserably, but you’ll handle it. And when you come out the other side, you will have learned something. You will have grown. You will have improved.

You have to be ready to accept failure. You have to accept that you don’t know a damn thing.

The only way you’re going to learn is by failing. Over and over and over. Accept that and suddenly you have no limits. Suddenly there is nothing stopping you from doing what you love. Suddenly the impossible seems doable. Suddenly life has more meaning. Suddenly you are the owner of your happiness.

Travel Update: Be sure to check out The Plan: 6 Months, 3 Countries, and $3,000.

Passionate inspiration occurs when you feel so inspired by something that you become engulfed with passion.

It might be triggered by a random blog post or comment that you read. It could be a conversation with a friend or an unexpected exchange with a stranger.

Whatever triggers it, you usually know when it happens. You suddenly feel a spark of inspiration followed by a flood of enthusiasm. A stream of ideas quickly turns into a river and before you know it you can’t keep up!

It doesn’t matter what type of writing you do — perhaps you’re a novelist, a journalist, a poet, or a programmer — this experience is universal among writers. If you’re a blogger, this flood of ideas — this flood of inspiration, is something you know would make for good blog post. It’s something you’d love to magically see go from brain to blog.

So do it!

The very moment it happens, do whatever you can to capture that inspirational passion.

If you’re lucky enough to be sitting in front of your computer, open a blank text document and just start typing. Maximize the window or make it full screen. Don’t worry about the post title or overall theme. Don’t worry about the spelling, the grammar, or the sentence structure.

Just write.

Get those thoughts out of your head. As soon as this flow starts it’s hard to stop, so the sooner you start capturing that energy the more you’ll capture.

Some of the best writing I have ever done has happened this way.

If I go back and reread posts that I have written in times of passionate inspiration, I will be amazed that I actually wrote them — it won’t even sound like me! Everything will echo so well with my beliefs and thought patterns, but I will feel as though I was reading something written by a total stranger!

And it’s happened again. This blog post was the result of a “spark of passionate inspiration”. Here’s how it started:

I was catching up with the articles in my RSS reader when I skimmed across a post by Glen Allsopp called A New Way to Look At Writing Blog Posts. As I read the title I started thinking about the method of writing that I’m talking about right now: Writing in times of passionate inspiration. Throughout reading the article, thoughts on writing with passionate inspiration began building.

Glen’s article ended up being about something other than what I had in mind, but nevertheless the spark was made; the floodgates were opened for the idea to start flowing.

Without hesitation, I opened my writing application to channel that torrent of passionate inspiration and this post was born.

One of the things I find most interesting about writing in a times of passionate inspiration is that the sentences and paragraphs seem to come together effortlessly; they rarely need any editing. It’s as if my brain is operating so clearly and so efficiently that it guides itself — as if some higher force is at the helm.

Glen’s technique of “writing until you’ve said everything you want to say, then edit[ing] after” seems vital to the process of writing with passionate inspiration. It’s extremely easy to get caught up in rearranging paragraphs and rewording sentences. Oftentimes that’s just enough distraction to lose the connection to the flow of inspiration.

When you’re writing, do your best to block out all unrelated thoughts.

You’ll have plenty of time for those other thoughts when you switch back to editing mode.

(Oddly enough, I find myself in the paradoxical situation of writing a blog post about passionate inspiration while trying not to lose the passionate inspiration that triggered the idea in the first place…)

If you catch yourself losing focus, try skimming what you’ve already written to see if you can get back on track and reconnect. If what triggered the inspiration was something you read, try reading it again. If it was a verbal interaction with someone, try recalling what was said or recreate the moment in your head.

Passionate inspiration that sparks an urge to write doesn’t exactly occur all the time — at least it certainly doesn’t for me — and finding a way to actively recreate this experience is probably still as much on your todo list as it is mine.

However, I’m beginning to believe that this experience isn’t something that can be created per se, but rather must be tuned into to; it must be received.

We are all fully capable of experiencing passionate inspiration on a regular basis if we tune into our unique “inspiration channel”.

So, how do we find our unique “inspiration channel”?

Over the past few days I’ve been directing my focus more towards being myself; towards being totally and brutally honest and truthful about my own aspirations and beliefs.

I’ve turned my attention away from external influences that told me how to craft a blog post or why I needed to figure out a theme for my blog. I’ve been consciously letting go of external expectations of who I should be, what I should be doing, or how I should be doing it.

Incredibly, from this sudden change in focus effortlessly arose a more defined life purpose and a list of things I do and don’t believe in, a post about Finding the Courage to Be Yourself, and this post about Capturing Moments of Passionate Inspiration to Produce your Best Writing.

By shifting my focus inward and listening to what was going on inside, several small, seemingly insignificant events around me — from the title of a blog post in my RSS reader to an unexpected encounter with my sister at Starbucks — sparked passionate inspiration not once, but several times.

A coincidence? I don’t think so.

I’m certainly not going to pretend to have the magic solution to finding passionate inspiration, but I feel confident in saying that it must come from a change within us; from a change in our perspective.

We need to clear our minds and listen. We must become receptive to inspiration and passionate to do something with it.

Inspiration is everywhere. We just need to slow down and listen for it.

Have you experienced passionate inspiration? What came of it? Do you have any specific methods of reconnecting with or triggering such moments? Please share in the comments below!

It’s not impossible, but it takes courage. It takes courage to be and to think differently. But the act of being and thinking differently is only different to those looking at you from the outside.

If you make up your mind that you’re fully in control of your destiny — if you decide to choose what you want to believe in — then you’re not being different. You’re being you.

Recognize that those who say you’re crazy, or those who try to stop you from being or thinking differently, are only confronting their own daemons; they’re trying to reaffirm their own beliefs.

If others give you advice, listen. If they tell you what you should or should not do, listen. But decide for yourself. Believe in yourself. Be yourself.

The only risk in being yourself is the risk of learning something about yourself. If you’re not willing to take that risk, then go ahead, follow the crowd; follow the well trodden path that so many others have followed.

On the other hand, if you’re willing to learn, to explore, and to discover, then step up to the plate. It’s your time to take charge. It’s time for you to shine. It’s time for you to take action and decide what you really want from life. It’s time to accept responsibility for being you.

Don’t be afraid. You can do this.

You will definitely make mistakes. Everybody does. Making mistakes is part of growing. It’s part of what it means to be human. If you’re afraid of making mistakes, then you’re afraid of being human! Doesn’t that sound silly? Why should you be afraid to be human?

Stop taking a comfortable, laid back approach to life. Stop taking it easy. Know that you are unique. And beautiful. And powerful. And smart. Know that you are capable of so much more than you currently believe. Know that as a human being your only limit to growth is the limit you decide to set for yourself.

Could you find happiness quietly settled in a mold that society expects you to sit in? Could you find happiness being like everybody else? Absolutely. Could you reach your full potential; your full potential to be happy, to love, to live? Absolutely not.

Your potential is limitless. Free yourself from false beliefs.

Those who love you will understand. Deep down inside they want you to be happy. They want you to be yourself. They want you to be real.

Be honest with yourself. Follow your intuition. Follow your inner compass.

Do you have a dream? Then follow it. Believe in it. Make it the driving force behind every single action; every single step. Dedicate every single breath to achieving that dream.

No dream? Then free yourself from anything that prevents you from exploring and discovering your dream.

And if you don’t discover your dream, maybe your dream is to simply live. Live happy. Live healthy. Live free. Laugh. Love.

This life is a one-way ticket to a wonderful journey. If you’re not being yourself, then you’re giving that ticket away to somebody else.

You deserve to be yourself.

It’s time to dig deep. It’s time to be strong. It’s time to put your foot down.

This is your chance.

Go!