Gandhi

Lori Prokop
Creator "How to Heal Abuse"
Co- Founder of the high traffic blog community Keyboard Culture

....that's when you have to tell yourself that things will get better.

There are times when people disappoint you and let you down,

but those are the times when you must remind yourself to trust your own judgments and opinions, to keep your life focused on believing in yourself and all that you are capable of.

There will be challenges to face and changes to make in your life,

and it is up to you to accept them.

Constantly keep yourself headed in the right direction for you. It may not be easy at times, but in those times of struggle you will find a stronger sense of who you are, So when the days come that are filled with frustration
and unexpected responsibilities,

remember to believe in yourself and all you want your life to be, because the challenges and changes will only help you to find the goals that you know are meant to come true for you.

Keep believing in yourself.

Author Unknown

Lori Prokop
Creator "How to Heal Abuse"
Co- Founder of the high traffic blog community Keyboard Culture

You may be feeling angry, annoyed or anxious. You might be feeling frustrated, overwhelmed or hopeless.

You’ll love this article because it will show you why no problem is too big to solve.

You have the power. And the 10 step Lori Prokop Anger Management System will help you take it back, even in the toughest of situations.

Here are 4 questions, which upon answering, which will provide the solution to your problem:

1) What are the concrete actions you are observing affecting your well-being?

2) How do you feel in connection with what you are observing?

3) What are the unfulfilled needs or desires creating your feelings?

4) What are the concrete actions you are requesting to enrich your life now?

You might be saying, “I don’t even know what these four questions mean. How can I answer questions I don’t understand? I need some help here.”

Great.

Here is a summary of the 10 steps of the Anger Management System, which will help you understand why no problem is too great to solve.

Here is a summary of the 10 steps of the Anger Management System, which will help you understand why no problem is too great to solve.

Step 1: Learn anger is a valuable warning signal of unfulfilled needs. It says to stop and become aware of your unfulfilled needs and the feelings created by those unfulfilled needs. Begin to look for result that would make your life more fulfilling, satisfying and wonderful.

Step 2: Learn to identify just the facts. Observe without judgment, shame, blame, guilt, wrongness or punishment of yourself or others.

Step 3: You learn your feelings result from your needs being met or not being met and never from what another person does or doesn’t do.

Step 4: You take control of your thinking and focus your awareness on your feelings and needs.

Step 5: You experience more personal power, contentment and ease as you get in touch with your needs and realize you can take positive action to get your needs met.

Step 6 and 7: You imagine and identify positive actions that will meet your needs right now.

Step 8: Your awareness moves to others involved. Before talking to them, you guess what the other person feels and needs. You identify actions which might contribute to his or her needs being met.

Step 9: Chose which person you would like to speak first with the knowingness you can continue talking until all needs are met through actions everyone is in agreement with and willing to take.

Step 10: Time to Talk. You put the steps into action communicating your observations, feelings, needs and requests and receiving the other person’s observations, feelings, needs and requests.

You stay focused on making clear requests and how you feel about what is being requested of you.

If you feel good, you might consider agreeing to the request.

If you feel bad, you might consider say no to the request and working towards a request you feel good about agreeing to.

You continue until everyone’s needs are met through actions everyone feels good about and agrees to take.

1) Is your observation clear and without judgment, shame, blame, guilt or diagnosis of yourself or others?

2) Are you able to name your feelings and needs?

3) Do you have a guess of what the other person’s feelings and needs are?

4) Do you have a clear request of what you want to have happen next?

Okay, then, now it is time to talk.

Here is a guideline on what to say (and not say).

2) Instead, when talking about what you are reacting to, stick to clear observations, just like what an emotionless video camera would say if it could speak. It might sound like, “I have been thinking about how you spend so much time at the office” or “In meetings you tell stories that are 10 to 15 minutes long and, eventually, have little to do with the subject of the meeting.”

3) After a clear observation, state a feeling that comes from your heart or a body sensation. (I feel lonely and sad. I feel annoyed and confused.)

4) Avoid statements like “I feel that you…” and “I feel like you…”

These statements are likely to be followed by blame, judgment or wrongness. You are unlikely to get your needs met by speaking in this manner.

5) Express heart-felt emotions and body sensations — not diagnosis, judgment or blame

Here is how you will know you have identified your needs. Your anger will be replaced by another feeling or you will feel other feelings along with anger.

Here is what to do next:

1) Name these feelings out loud, not the anger, but the other feelings. (I feel sad and lonely.)

2) Then name your need out loud. (I realize I need more companionship, connection and nurturing.)

3) Then make a request that invites a response from the other person that would make life more wonderful and fulfilling right now. (Would you agree to spend Tuesday nights and Sundays with our family?)

The other person will want understanding for his or her feelings and needs also.

Unless he or she knows the 10 steps of my Launch from Good to Great Anger Management System, it is likely he or she will not have the awareness or skills you have.

When he or she speaks to you, it might sound something like, “You’re always thinking of yourself. You’re selfish. All you care about is yourself.”

I call this Termite Talk.

Termite Talk

Think of what termites do to the wooden foundation of any structure.

They eat at it until it is dust.

This is what judgment, shame, blame, guilt, wrongness and punishment talk does.

So how do you deal with angry people who are using Termite Talk?

First, you realize that you want your needs met.

Termite Talk erodes any possibility of a foundation that could get your needs met. Your needs are the most important. So choose the talk most likely to fulfill your needs.

What is it?

Eagle Talk. An eagle is a leader and a sign of enlightenment and freedom. But you might not feel like a leader. You are, even if you are leading one, yourself. And you might not feel free. You are, if you are able to communicate your needs.

What is Eagle Talk?

It is communicating empathy, observations, feelings, needs and requests in a heart-connected way without judgment, shame, blame, guilt, wrongness or punishment of yourself or others.

How do you start to get your needs met when you deal with angry people using Termite Talk?

The most powerful tool for transforming Termite Talk into getting your needs met is empathy.

What is Empathy?

Empathy is the capacity to give your non-judgmental attention in the present moment to a sufferer, regardless of how he or she is communicating.

It is being attentive to others and their experiences.

It is being in the presence of people with weaker communication skills — who are talking and acting judgment, blame, shame, guilt, punishment or wrongness — and realize this is the only way they know to get their needs met. It is tragic and sad.

You choose to use the stronger communication skills outlined in this anger management system. So you stay you’re your observations, your feelings, your needs and your requests.

It is listening to others without taking on their feelings.

Feeling another’s feelings is sympathy.

When we are sympathizing (I feel what you are feeling) we are not empathizing (I am here with you with total acceptance and not judgment, shame, blame, guilt, wrongness or punishment. I am here with you and not taking what you say personally, because I understand it’s about your skill level in communicating unfulfilled needs.)

So if a person attacks you, you know they have a low skill level for identifying and communicating unfulfilled needs.

Using this Anger Management System, you have a greater skill level to deal with angry people or people who have only lower skill levels.

After Empathizing

After empathizing, move your attention to the other person’s feelings and needs. Guess what action the other person might like to meet his or her needs.

It could be a general statement like, “Are you worried (or other feeling) about consideration for your needs and want to know that I am willing to consider your needs as well my own needs (or other action)?”

Or more specific question like, “Are you feeling sad and lonely and need to feel nurtured and connection?”

What to Avoid

Make sure to avoid “Are you feeling sad and lonely because you are mad I spend too much time at the office?”

A statement like this starts out connecting to feelings and then quickly moves to blame. This fuels and perpetuates the person’s lower skill level of blame and wrongness.

Increasing Your Personal Power

Communicating that you hear a person is very different than agreeing he or she is right or wrong.

By hearing how others feel and what they want, you can make sure you clearly understand their needs and request so you can make decisions about whether you want to agree to those requests.

When you demonstrate you really understand what others feel and need, you will be amazed how quickly they will trust their needs are as important to you as your need are to you.

You will find even the most difficult, angry people will be open to considering your needs, as you are considering theirs, and be more receptive to various strategies to meeting everyone’s needs.

Start by imagining that everyone’s needs can be understood and met; no one “winning” at the cost of the other.

This anger management system is complete only after both people have been heard, understood and walk away satisfied.

If only one person has been heard, understood and satisfied, you are half-way done.

Since only one person can be actually heard at a time, ask yourself these questions to determine who will speak first and who will listen first:

1) Do you want to communicate how you feel and what you need for the other person to understand right now?

2) Or do you want to understand how the other person feels and what they need first?

3) Who is feeling the most pain?

4) Who has the most clarity of what they feel and what they need?

You may consider the person with the most clarity focusing on hearing the feelings and needs of the person in the most pain.

The feeling of being heard and understood will most likely help the person in the most pain feel relief and clarity.

When both people are at the same point of relief, understanding and clarity they may both feeling more willing to consider each others needs.

Either way, with my Anger Management System, you have the awareness to deal with angry people successfully – be that yourself or others.

Following this anger management system, you have the anger management skills to decide who will focus on feelings, needs and requests first.

If you choose to go first, you will be talking about your feelings, needs and requests to the other person.

If you choose for the other person to go first, he or she will be talking about his or her feelings, needs and requests to you.

Success Talk

If they do not know how to talk feelings, needs and requests, you can start by sharing your guesses (as detailed in step eight of the Anger Management System), in the form of questions.

It might sound like, “Are you feeling scared, overwhelmed and hopeless and need to know your family will be safe and have food and shelter?”

The question is “Are you feeling _______________ and need ________________?” It is a question and not a statement. You are not telling them what they feel and need. You are guessing.

Stick closely to this question, because it keeps the focus on feelings and needs. This removes judgment, punishment, criticism, blame and enemy images.

What NOT to Say

The question is NOT “Are you feeling __________ because I (or someone else) __________?”

Stay away from this question.

The part of the statement “because I (or someone else)” implies judgment, punishment, wrongdoing, criticism, blame and enemy images. This nearly guarantees your needs and those of others will not be met.

The question is NOT “What do you think about that?” or “What do you feel about that?”

Stay away from this question.

It puts the focus on logic which produces judgment, punishment, wrongdoing, criticism, blame and enemy images. Yes, most often when you ask someone how they feel, she or he will tell you what they think.

To resolve conflict, deal with angry people and get everyone’s needs met, we must stay with observations, feelings, needs and requests.

Even if you ask a person how he or she feels, often he or she doesn’t know; the response is negative thoughts and not feelings

The question is NOT “You shouldn’t feel __________” or “You should feel __________.”

Again, avoid these statements.

They are suicidal to getting your needs met.

Why?

People will not meet your needs if their needs are not being met.

Even if they say they will, they (consciously or unconsciously) sabotage your needs being met or you will pay a costly price the next time you present needs.

For anyone who says, “The other people are wrong. They should NOT have said what they said and did what they did. They don’t deserve to have their needs met.”

This is holding an enemy image of the other person. It is costly to whoever is holding the enemy image.

Before speaking, acting or attempting to get your needs met, if you need to resolve any enemy image, start with step one of the Anger Management System.

To get your needs met and resolve the problem, you must identify and communicate awareness of your own feelings, needs and requests, and help other people do the same.

How could you help other people, especially when you deal with angry people?

Use steps two through seven of my Anger Management System to guess in your mind what the other person is experiencing. Don’t worry about being accurate.

This guess is your best attempt at understanding what the other person is feeling and what the other person’s needs are when they acted as you observed.

The act of going through the steps will connect you with the other person on a heart level. The heart level connection is what’s important to open the door for mutual care and understanding.

At this point, you haven’t spoken yet.

Translate judgments, diagnosis and blame statements into what you guess the other person feels and wants.

If you are not able to do this and, instead, want to blame or feel the person doesn’t deserve to have their needs met, you are still holding enemy images. These will need to be resolved before a atmosphere where needs are mutually met.

So let’s apply this step. If we were guessing, “she’s unreliable” could mean:

Guess One

Possible Feeling and What It Could Look Like

She might feel irritated, frustrated and helpless. She may not understand the requests. She may feel like her actions don’t matter. She might feel like no matter what she does it will be criticized, so why try.

Possible Needs

She needs clarity, respect and reassurance.

Guess Two

Possible Feeling and What It Could Look Like

She might feel hopeless, lonely and uncomfortable. She may be scared to say no and, instead, say yes and not show up.

Possible Needs

She needs to be nurtured, cared for and loved.

Guess Three

Possible Feelings and What It Could Look Like

She may feel scared, overwhelmed and hopeless. She may prioritize overtime more important than time-off from work with the family.

Possible Needs

She needs to feel safe and have food and shelter for her family.

Identifying Feelings and Needs

If identifying feelings and needs is difficult for you, here is a list of some you can refer to:

Feelings When Your Needs Are Being Met:

Grateful
Confident
Energized
Eager
Stimulated
Proud
Intrigued
Hopeful
Content
Ease
Relieved
Surprised
Amazed
Touched
Joyful
Bliss
Optimistic

Feelings When Your Needs Are Not Being Met:

Angry
Rage
Disappointment
Frustration
Jelous
Annoyed
Sad
Depressed
Powerless
Helpless
Hopeless
Irritated
Nervous
Confused
Embarrassed
Concerned
Lonely
Overwhelmed
Impatient
Reluctant

Basic Needs All People Have
(This list is a start; there are more)

Physical – air, food, to move, exercise, protection from life-threatening situations, rest, se.x.ual expression, shelter, nurturing, touch, water

Play – fun, laughter, expression

Spirit – heart level connection, harmony, beauty of surroundings, inspiration, organization, flexibility, answers to deep questions, peace.

Community – acceptance, gratitude, connection, consideration, life-enhancing contributions, emotional safety, other people present and listening

Creativity – meaning, intuitive connection, able to feel safe being true self, self-worth

Recognition – celebrate creation of life, celebrate fulfilled dreams, mourning losses of loved ones or dreams

Independence – choosing your own dreams, goals and values; choosing your own plans for how you will fulfill dreams, goals and values

How to Get What You Want

At this point, even though you are not talking to the person yet, you are seeing them differently than as an “enemy.”

You are able to see a human with needs. They want life on earth to be more enjoyable by getting needs satisfied.

Even a person who hurts another believes by hurting that person, his or her own needs will be fulfilled. This is a tragic, temporary and costly way to attempt to meet needs.

Reality is an individual’s needs are actually only met when others’ needs are met too.

In the next newsletter, you will learn how you can get your needs met when dealing with angry, unstable or ridiculous people.

This anger management step focuses on the power you have to undo this misconception and choose to deal with angry people in a way that makes life more wonderful for you and others.

To do this, you will identify:

1) Your clear observation without judgment, wrongness or blame
2) Your feelings,
3) Your needs and
4) A clear request.

What is a clear request?

“I want you to be more reliable,” is not clear or achievable.

Why?

He may believe he is being reliable by sitting on the couch day after day, because you can rely on the fact you can find him there.

But you may view reliable as getting off the couch and taking out the garbage.

Here is how to transform anger and deal with angry people so you can resolve any problem and get what you want.

The idea is to imagine the other person doing or saying something, right now, that is in agreement with your desire and likely to meet your need.

Ask yourself, “At this moment, exactly what could the person say or do to meet my needs?”

Using the steps from the Anger Management System, a woman passed over for a promotion becomes:

1) (Observation) Clear about describing the situation without judgment or punishment

2) (Identify Feelings and Needs) She is aware her anger is about the need for recognition, for respect and to feed her family. As she identifies her needs, she finds she is also feeling sad, scared and hopeless.

3) (Request) Aware she needs to make a clear, positive request for action here in the now.
So she may say to her boss, “Would you agree to review with me, within the next week, at least two projects I have already completed that you believe have contributed to improvement in our department?”

You may say, but what if the other person is wrong or at fault? What if they have done something that needs punishment?

This is like wanting the tire on your car to stop being flat.

You can want all you want.

But, to resolve the problem, you have to identify what needs to be done to fix the tire. Then take the action to achieve it.

But, it can be hard to figure out what you need.

Especially since most people have been programmed from early ages that needs are bad or selfish, and a person is better, stronger or more acceptable when they do not have needs.

This is like saying a person who stops breathing is better, stronger or more acceptable than the humans who need oxygen to stay alive. It makes no sense.

Needs are an inner compass and direction showing us how to live and do well.

Needs are your inborn owner’s manual. They are interactive so when your needs are not being met, your emotions and body let you know.

Life can be tough, really tough. People can be…well you know…they can be difficult, to say the least.

When you feel the twings of anger, this is the red light warning signal that your needs are not being met. It is the inner compass saying “go inside and ask yourself what you want and need.”

Say a person gets angry when around a co-worker. The question becomes, when you are around this person, what needs are not being met?

It could be the person is not helping you meet your needs or it could be the person is just triggering a reminder that your needs are not being met.

Let’s say you were in a meeting with a person who interrupted you.

If you are trained to think and communicate like most people, you might say to the other person, “You are an idiot. You make me so mad. I want you to stop interrupting me.”

The problem with this response is that the other person hears how they are wrong (blame) and what you DON’T want. This gives the other person every option but what you don’t want. They may figure, “Okay, I will make sure I don’t interrupt you by making sure you don’t talk.”

The other person may solve the problem by dominating the conversation.

Or here is another possible result from this statement. The other person may stop talking and expect you to mind-read, punishing when your guesses are wrong.

How to Get What You Want

You are much more likely to get your needs met when you formulate a positive request that clearly states what actions would meet your needs.

For example, “Would you agree to listen until I finish my sentence, and keep your comments related directly to the topic at hand?”

Place the focus on what you do want, not on what you don’t want.

That statement can feel like a loaded question.

We are taught “not to want” by people who want their lives to feel “easier” by not having to help others achieve well-being. This doesn’t mean they were bad people. Rather, they had needs they chose to put before your needs.

Often, they didn’t even realize how to identify and get their own needs met and, as a result, didn’t have the skills to help or teach others.

Having unmet needs is the source of low self-worth, lack of self confidence and fear and worry for many people.

Part of living a peaceful life, including achieving world peace, is realizing that overlooking or postponing your own and others’ needs and well-being is very costly and only temporary.

What’s the First Clue You Have Unmet Needs?

What a person is saying, often subconsciously, when expressing anger is, “Help me identify my unmet needs and get them met.”

What they are often consciously saying is some form of blame, shame or wrongness such as, “You make me so angry. If you wouldn’t do that, then I wouldn’t be angry.”

You have choice.

You can choose to take their verbalized comments personally and, therefore, create your own unmet needs and perpetuate anger.

Or you can see anger for the signal that it is.

You can realize when people express anger in the form of judgment, shame, blame, guilt or wrongness, they do not have the skills to identify and communicate their needs.

Without these skills, their needs go unfulfilled.

When even ONE person in a group has these anger management skills they can lead the group in such as way as to end conflict, worry, fear and, even, violence (which is conflict, fear and worry that has fermented into an explosive state).

End the Fear of Fear and Worry

Using the Anger Management System, an employee who felt the boss was unprofessional, was disrespectful and had a big mouth would look underneath the employee’s anger and translate his judgments into needs.

He may realize he values reliability, clear communication, timeliness and trust. Once needs are identified, the employee’s feelings move from anger to worry, anxiety and disappointment.

Even the harshest labels like freak, scammer or psychopath are just tragic and costly expressions of unmet needs by name callers who lack the communication skills to identify and get their needs met.

It’s tragic because the act of making another person wrong or punishing another person almost guarantees the blamer’s needs will go undiscovered, unexpressed and unmet.

Even if it appears the blamer’s needs are being met, it will be costly and only temporary for the blamer.

Overcoming Fear and Worry

Once you discover what you need, you are in the powerful position of overcoming fear and worry and choosing life-enhancing actions to get your needs met.

This always backfires.

Wants and desires are innate mechanisms to keep us alive and evolving. It would be like repressing your breath, heart beat or digestion and still expecting to live a full, happy, healthy life.

We all have the exact same needs. Every need that you have, the people you see as enemies or “wrong” also have. The only people who don’t have needs are dead.

We all need respect, safety, nourishment, harmony, connection and love to name a few.

What Few People Know About Anger

Anger is a sign that “blame thinking” is going on in your head, and you have unmet needs.

If your blame statement was, “She never listens to me,” what emotions or body sensations would you feel?

Would you feel anxious, sad, rage, frustration or confused?

Depending on the situation, you might be happy this person is ignoring you.

So the act of being ignored does not always cause lower level emotions.

If you were speeding in your car and drove by a police officer, you might be happy if she ignored you.

So being ignored is not always something that triggers anger or blame. It is how you think about the situation that triggers the anger or blame.

Your feelings results from whether or not your needs are being met.

Anger comes from focusing your attention on what another person “should” or “shouldn’t” be doing and judging them as “wrong” or “bad.”

Instead, anger’s purpose is to let you know its time to focus on your needs. Once you do, anger is replaced by other feelings. Transforming anger in this way is not repressing it or “cooling down.”

When you are aware of your unmet needs, you could have very intense, painful emotions that will be different than anger.

As your focus changes from judgment or punishment to identifying what you need, anger moves to sadness, hurt, fear or disappointment.

In a business setting, someone might answer, “He’s so unprofessional and disrespectful. He is a jerk, is a bad boss and has a big mouth.”

This statement tells very little about what’s really happening.

In this anger management step, you want “just the facts.”

Here is a statement containing facts. Observe the difference.

“He interrupts people before they finish their sentences. When we are trying to resolve problems, instead of staying on the subject, he tells stories that have nothing to do with the subject at hand, and this makes our meetings run longer than scheduled.”

In this anger management step, you peel the layers until you can discover and define, without blame or judgment, what is not meeting your needs.

When I outline this step, sometimes I hear, “But, the other person is WRONG! Lori Prokop, how can you expect me to be detached and talk about just the facts?”

Statements like, “You insulted me,” or “I feel disrespected,” or “You are always trying to make me do what you want”:

1) Imply the other person is wrong,
2) Are observations which include blame or judgment and
3) Don’t clearly describe what actually happened

How do you make a clear observation?

Think of a video camera. It has no emotions. It records only fact. Ask yourself this question:

“If a video camera recorded this, and spoke in only fact, how would it describe this situation?”

It might sound like “I heard you say that you don’t like it when I yell,” or “You said you don’t agree with the deadline,” or “You threw the vase across the room and it broke,” or “You did not come home last night and did not call to let us know you were safe.”

Once you view situations and speak from this perspective, you can begin to deal with angry people successfully.

1) We are upset our needs are not being met
2) We are blaming ourselves or others for us not getting what we want
3) If we speak or act from anger, it will almost guarantee we will not get what we want or we will regret it later.

When we feel angry, we are focused on what we don’t want or don’t have. Our thinking becomes about the wrongness of others.

The tragedy is we have lost sight of what we do want and need.

Here is step one of my 10 step Launch from Good to Great Anger Management System to transform your own anger and successfully deal with difficult, angry people.

You’re approaching an intersection and see the stop lights aren’t working as they normally would. They are blinking red in all four directions.

Drivers know a blinking red light means to stop, pause and evaluate the situation before moving ahead. They appreciate the blinking red light, because they understand its importance. It warns them of oncoming traffic preventing harm and providing the opportunity for choice.

The driver’s goal is not to ignore the blinking red light.

Just like a blinking red light draws a driver’s attention to an intersection of options, anger can be a wonderful wake up call to see what needs are important to you and provide you an opportunity to choose.

The purpose of your emotions and their physical manifestations in your body are to give you a physical sign when your needs are and are not being met.

When you feel good, your needs are being met.

When you feel bad, your needs are not being met.

Step one says when tempers flare or violence emerges…to make life enjoyable again for yourself and others:

1) Focus your thoughts on what you need
2) Heal any images of others being “wrong.” These are called enemy images.
3) The goal is for all parties to have their needs met.

You may be saying, “How could I possibly care about the needs of others when they are wrong or have done something terrible?”

Stick with me here. You’ll be amazed at how wonderful applying this anger management system will feel.

To resolve tempers or violence, remember, you can make life peaceful and enjoyable for yourself and others when you choose to focus on what you need, and put aside any enemy images of the other person as “wrong.”

To make your life more wonderful quickly, make your goal to identify your unfulfilled needs and intend a resolution so satisfying that everyone involved gets their needs met too.

It feels great to live in harmony with what you desire. It feels really good to help other people experience what they desire, when there is no coercion, force, intimidation or manipulation involved.

Is it possible to get what you want in way that feels safe and good?

Yes, it’s possible to get what you want and have your needs met, even when you deal with angry people.

Here are the 10 steps to transform anger and successfully deal with angry people.

Step 1

Learn anger is a valuable warning signal of unfulfilled needs.

It says to stop and become aware of your unfulfilled needs and the feelings created by those unfulfilled needs.

Begin to look for result that would make your life more fulfilling, satisfying and wonderful.

Step 2

Learn to identify just the facts.

Step 3

You learn your feelings result from your needs being met or not being met and never from what another person does or doesn’t do.

Step 4

You take control of your thinking and focus your awareness on your feelings and needs.

Step 5

You experience more personal power, contentment and ease as you get in touch with your needs and realize you can take positive actions to get your needs met.

Steps 6 and 7

You determine and identify positive actions that will meet your needs right now.

Step 8

Your awareness moves to others involved.

Before talking to them, you guess what the other person feels and needs.

You identify actions which might contribute to his or her needs being met.

Step 9

Chose who you would like to speak first with the knowingness you can continue talking until all needs are met through actions everyone is in agreement with and willing to take.

Step 10

Now it’s time to talk.

You put the steps into action communicating your observations, feelings, needs and requests and receiving the other person’s observations, feelings, needs and requests.

You stay focused on making clear requests and how you feel about what is being requested of you.

As you listen to the request, if you feel good, you might consider agreeing to the request.

If you feel bad, you might consider say no to the request and working towards a request you feel good about agreeing to.

You continue until everyone’s needs are met through actions everyone feels good about and agrees to take.

Will this work even with difficult, unreasonable and angry people? It has resolved wars, solved corporate battles, mended families and much more.

So what is a belief?

The definition is very simple. A belief is information or an idea you have learned that you choose to think over and over again.

Here is the shocking fact about beliefs. Simply because people believe certain information does not make the information automatically true or accurate.

The biggest danger in our world is not questioning our beliefs, but the assumption we have all the answers. The danger is not in the possibility of new information but the inclination to run from it. The danger is not in dramatically new ideas about life and our Creator but trying to create a better life with the same old ideas.

Understanding Who We Really Are

In my research I have found the most powerful way to understand life and who we really are starts with understanding the experience of death and who we become — after this life.

Before we can heal from abuse and became the person we desire, we have to gain an understanding of the full potential of who that person could be.

At the moment right after death, when your life force leaves your body, science has measured your body is immediately 21 grams or ¾ of an ounce lighter. Something has left your body.

What is this about?

In his book and documentary movie, Life After Life, which have sold over 13 million copies, Dr. Raymond Moody interviewed over 2,000 people who had been declared dead for as many as three days and returned to live again in their bodies.

I found his documentary movie to be incredibly fascinating and highly recommend you view it, if for no other reason than another perspective on life.

For 30 years, Dr. Moody researched to uncover if there is, indeed, life after death. By looking at the near death experiences of thousands of people Dr. Moody uncovered how we could choose to live if we desire to create what we want in our lives.

During the research, Dr. Moody found prior religious belief did not have a bearing on whether a person had a near death experience. And when the people interviewed for the research returned from being medically dead, these people had a dramatically new view of life.

Whatever desires for external satisfaction that were important in their lives before death, be it money, power or fame or many of the other things people seek, after their resurrections these people said the most important thing to them is love and their main life purpose is to seek authentically loving relationship with other people. They have no doubt that there is a God. They know there is life after death.

After a medical doctor was declared dead by doctors he reported that he could see the medical staff but they could not see him. The medical doctor searched the hospital looking for his body. Finally he found a body which had his fraternity ring on its finger.

But what if, as the body is dying, this is just hallucinations or a natural shutting down process of the brain?

People who have come back from death have given very accurate details of what went on after their deaths. They could not have known this information unless they were still, in some form without their bodies, alive and able to intelligently gather and process information.

A medical worker was part of a team who resuscitated a young woman who had been pronounced dead from excessive bleeding but came back to life. When the patient came back to life, she grabbed the medical worker saying when she was out of her body the patient saw a shoe on a ledge on the upper floor of the hospital. The medical worker was able to go to the ledge area and verify the shoe was in the location exactly as the patient specified.

A Russian doctor said his experience with death was amazing. He was everywhere he thought about and, at the same time, with his dead body in the morgue. He did not have to leave one place for another. He could be in New York, Texas and Moscow simultaneously. There was no distance or time.

The Russian doctor said when he was dead and out of his body, he could communicate with very little children in bodies who couldn’t speak or walk yet but were just coming from the place the doctor was going. He reported this was an amazing spiritual communication without words, but a mental, energetic communication.

The Russian doctor explained as he was leaving his body, he could feel the pain of the body. After death, he was in darkness and could not see anything. He realized he was not in his body. It scared him to be without his body and still alive.

The Russian doctor’s training was in science. As a doctor and scientist, in his thinking it was impossible to be somewhere without his body. He humorously said it scared him to death to be without his body but he was already dead.

He found it amazing to be dead, yet have the ability to think and understand. One of his first understandings after death and outside his body was that by simply thinking, he existed and was alive.

His next desire was to move from darkness to light. So he began to think about light. When he did, he saw light in the darkness. His next thought was to go into the light. When he thought this, he immediately, without a body or the need for physical action, moved to the light.

One of the most common patterns with the thousands of people who have died and lived to tell about it is the power of their own thoughts creating what they experience.

They report that the life force within all of us, allowing you to feel and think as a human, lives on after you leave your body. This life force is your emotions and your thoughts — your ability to think and feel.