Two Perspectives

Two Perspectives on Vision Boards as a Tool for Transformation

Dr. Amit Nagpal, New Delhi, India, and

Dr. Janet Smith Warfield, Florida, USA

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Dr. Amit Nagpal’s Perspective

My philosophy “Enlarge, Excel and Evolve” sums up my vision and hence represents my vision board too. In the narrow sense, the philosophy is “Enlarge as a human being, Excel as a social media being and Evolve as a personal brand” but in the broad sense of the phrase, “Enlarge, Excel and Evolve” signifies enlarging (continuous personal growth), excelling at whatever you do and evolving as a human being all the time.

Our vision should not be restricted to just ambitions & family but it should represent our desire to give back to society and to embrace the Universe with gratitude. For the same reason, in the image the man is standing with open arms to embrace the Universe with faith and open mindedness. The colour scheme of the picture also portrays the beauty of life while the yellow and the brightness highlight optimism towards life.

I have been a seeker of personal growth since childhood and I believe that we have so much to work upon in our own personalities, that we hardly have a right to blame others and find fault. The only exception is professional situations where it is our duty to audit and monitor others. I remember in my last job, when the audit team used to come to my department, I used to address them as a team on “Fault Finding Mission” (of course at their back in this case).

I like to do frontbiting in general (and I sure have a reputation for that), but backbiting is the only option sometimes. If you can find some imperfection in my vision board, I shall be glad. I do not strive for perfection, I strive for excellence. I do not try to be divine; I just try to be better and better human being.

If you have a vision for your life, you need a vision board. But if you are not sure, where you want to go, any road will take you there.

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Dr. Janet Smith Warfield’s Perspective

Why do you need a vision board?

To refocus your attention and intention on all the good things you want to bring into your life. Your right attention and “right intention,” as the Buddhists say, helps manifest these good things in your life.

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How do you use a vision board?

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Janet Smith Warfield serves wisdom-seekers who want understanding and clarity so they can live peaceful, powerful, prosperous lives. Through her unique combination of holistic, creative, right-brain transformational experiences and 22 years of rigorous, left-brain law practice, she has learned how to sculpt words in atypical ways to shift her listeners into experiences beyond words, transforming turmoil into inner peace. For more information, see wordsculptures.com, janetsmithwarfield.com, and wordsculpturespublishing.com.

Two Perspectives on Mind Mapping

Dr. Amit Nagpal, New Delhi, India, and

Dr. Janet Smith Warfield, Florida, USA

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Dr. Amit Nagpal’s Perspective

Mind Mapping as a Process

What is a Mind Map?

A mind map is a graphical and simple way to represent ideas and concepts. It helps in structuring information, and as a result helps in better analysis, comprehension, synthesis, recall and idea generation.

Why Should I Mind Map?

Our brain consists of neurons and each neuron is connected to several other neurons in a web kind of structure. In a mind map also, information is structured in a non-linear way that resembles how our brain actually works. Since it is an analytical as well as artistic activity, it engages the brain in a more useful way (utilizing both left and right parts of the brain) and due to its artistic and colourful nature it is fun.

Benefits of Mind Maps

1. Taking notes in a class or meeting
2. Brainstorming and creative problem solving
3. Making plans
4. Presenting information
5. Synthesizing information
6. Time management
7. Decision making
8. Summarizing a book, article or blog post

How to Make a Mind Map

I learned mind-mapping from Ms. SadaNam Kaur, a Life Coach based in Spain. (I am doing a self leadership course which has mind mapping as part of the creativity module).

The following points need to be kept in mind while making a mind map:

• Start the mind map in the centre of page and use the page in landscape format.
• Core topic will be in the centre and sub-topics will be in periphery.
• Topic labels should be single word as far as possible and when possible use a picture.
• The lines radiating from the centre will be thick and will become thinner as they move into the periphery (groups/branches).
• Different colours are used to make it artistic and attractive.
• Pictures are also used to make it attractive.
• It is not linear but radiant/web like
• There are no sentences, so words are used in a way which suggest sentences e.g. in the mind map below under drawing there are 3 points viz words, 1000 and picture which means a picture says a thousand words.
• As lines become thinner as they radiate towards the periphery, the word (font) also becomes smaller signifying the importance of those words in the mind map.
• The lines should be connected starting from the central image/word.

A Final Word

According to Wilkipedia, a British psychology author is considered the inventor of modern mind-mapping. Buzan argues that while “traditional” outlines force readers to scan left to right and top to bottom, readers actually tend to scan the entire page in a non-linear fashion. Buzan also uses popular assumptions about the cerebral hemispheres in order to promote the exclusive use of mind mapping over other forms of note making. The mind map continues to be used in various forms, and for various applications including learning and education (where it is taught as “mind webs”, or “webbing”), planning, and in engineering diagramming.

YouTube video: What is Mind Mapping?
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Dr. Amit Nagpal is a Personal Branding Consultant, passionate Blogger, and Motivational Speaker based in New Delhi, India. He specializes in personal branding with a holistic touch. His philosophy is “Take Charge of your Life and your Brand” He writes a Blog, “The Joys of Teaching”
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Dr. Janet Smith Warfield’s Perspective

Mind Mapping for Clarity

Mind mapping is a process that weaves together related thoughts and ideas to bring clarity and meaning into your life. You can do it in the privacy of your own home.

Set aside a time when you won’t be interrupted. Get yourself a pen and a pad of paper and write down whatever thoughts flow through your mind. If you’re struggling with a problem, begin with that. If there’s something you want to bring into your life, begin with that. Do not censor your thoughts. If you censor your thoughts, you’ll stay stuck in exactly the same thought patterns that created the problem in the first place or prevented you from moving toward what you want to do with your life.

Remind yourself that no one except you has to see what you write. The thoughts that flow through your mind and onto your paper are for your eyes alone unless you choose to share them. When you’re finished writing, you can burn or shred the paper if you want.

Approach your writing with a sense of exploration and discovery. Don’t judge or condemn what comes out. Just step back and notice it. Mmmmmmmmmm! That’s interesting. I had no idea that thought was in my head. What message is it bringing me? What can I learn? Is it telling me something about an action step that would move me toward solving my problem or giving me information about what I want to bring into my life? What meaning is it bringing? Is it adding a new piece to the puzzle I’m trying to solve?

When you notice resistance to one of the thoughts flowing through your mind, ask yourself why. Is it a thought that you were told was evil? Does it make you feel guilty? Does it bring up anger or fear? Just notice, then choose to appreciate it for the clarity it has brought you or tuck it back down into the recesses of your mind. This may simply not be the right time to hear the message the thought is bringing.

As you allow your thoughts to spill out onto the paper, notice if you experience sudden clarity that you didn’t have before. Notice if you feel an energetic shift in your body. Which thoughts make you feel good? Which thoughts make you feel bad?  Which keep returning over and over? The thoughts that keep returning over and over are thoughts that are desperately trying to bring you a message. What are they telling you about what you need to change in your life?

Notice if your thoughts are about other people and how they should change. Notice if your thoughts are about things that happened in the past or things that may happen in the future. When you focus on what other people should think, say, or do or when you focus on the past or future, you give away your present personal power.

Take your power back by keeping your mind in the present moment, trusting it, and trusting the process that is always there to support you when you are open to receiving and appreciating that support. You can call this process “God,” “Higher Power,” “Universal Energy,” or any other name you want to give it. It wants you to be joyful, prosperous, and powerful. You simply need to be willing to receive what it has to offer.

The alignment you experience brings you coherence, balance, clarity, courage, understanding, integrity, and peace. You end up trusting your gut, trusting your thoughts, trusting your intuition, and trusting your life. Your power comes from working with your own emotions, actions, thoughts, and energetic system, right here, right now, in each and every moment. By doing this, you create your own sacred space, an internal alignment with your own being and integrity. This is the only place where you are always safe.

For more information, here’s a good YouTube video: Using Mind Mapping to Gain Clarity

________________________________________________________________________________________Dr. Janet Smith Warfield serves wisdom-seekers who want understanding and clarity so they can live peaceful, powerful, prosperous lives. Through her unique combination of holistic, creative, right-brain transformational experiences and 22 years of rigorous, left-brain law practice, she has learned how to sculpt words in atypical ways to shift her listeners into experiences beyond words, transforming turmoil into inner peace. To learn more, see www.wordsculptures.com, www.wordsculpturespublishing.com, www.janetsmithwarfield.com

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Two Perspectives on Loyalty

Dr. Amit Nagpal, New Delhi, India, and

Dr. Janet Smith Warfield, Florida, USA

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Dr. Amit Nagpal’s Perspective

The “L” alphabet probably has the most difficult and confusing terms. Love and loyalty are two of them. It is easier to be an opportunist than to be loyal. But loyalty pays you in the long run. It inspires trust, it creates a reputation and it contributes to your personal brand.

Some people even say love and loyalty are the same. So what is the meaning of loyalty? What is the definition of loyalty?

What loyalty means to me

When I say, my friend is loyal to me, it generally means;-

• He considers my enemies as his enemies.
• He will not backbite against me.
• He will protest or argue or defend if someone criticizes me.
• He will be a friend in need.
• He will not publicly complain, even if he has a grudge against me and rather discuss privately.
• He will stand by my side, even if my parents criticize me and will share his opinion with me in private and try to be non-judgmental and yet give me friendly advice or tell me if I am wrong.

Loyalty – another misused word

Should we commit violence and murder in the name of loyalty? Some people cut their fingers in India when their political leaders lose the elections. Is this loyalty? Does being loyal mean emotionally overwhelmed and unstable?

If a man commits murder to loot a person to save his ailing mother, is it loyalty? Many Hindi (Indian) films have similar dilemmas. Were those Indians who were loyal to the British Empire traitors to the nation? I am leaving for the readers to decide. Nothing is right or wrong. Our inner voice knows what is wrong and right in that particular situation.

How do we learn loyalty?

I think we learn loyalty mainly from our parents and their behavior. Of course, perceptions and behavior relating to loyalty among friends, relatives, siblings and teachers also influence us. It is also possible you may be influenced more by your grandparent than your parent and he/she being your role model becomes the role model for loyalty too.

Clash of loyalties

A woman should be more loyal to husband or parents? The question is as difficult to answer as whether an Indian NRI in USA should be more loyal to India or to United States. My personal opinion is to be equally loyal, for the native country, you have emotional loyalty and for the country of residence, you need to have logical loyalty (it is feeding you and in India we say, you have to be loyal to the salt). Over a period of time if the husband is very caring or the country of residence gives you a very caring environment, you will develop emotional loyalty to husband or the country of residence.

True loyalty

The most difficult loyalty is the loyalty to truth or God. It is easier to be loyal to human relationships but difficult to stay loyal to the right, to the truth or to the conscience.

Our inner voice also wants us to be loyal to truth. But it is easier said than done.

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Dr. Amit Nagpal is a Personal Branding Consultant, passionate Blogger, and Motivational Speaker based in New Delhi, India. He specializes in personal branding with a holistic touch. His philosophy is “Take Charge of your Life and your Brand” He writes a Blog, “The Joys of Teaching”

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Dr. Janet Smith Warfield’s Perspective

Encarta Dictionary defines loyalty as “a feeling of devotion, duty, or attachment to somebody or something.” But who is that “somebody” or “something” to which we feel devotion, duty or attachment? And to what extent should we carry out that devotion, duty and attachment? And what do we do when we experience a conflict of loyalties? These are not easy questions.

As children, we are very attached to our parents, regardless of whether they are loving or abusive. We have little choice, because we depend on them for our food, clothing, and shelter.

As we grow, we begin to make friends. Why do we choose some over others? Isn’t it because we meet each others’ needs and we feel comfortable in each others’ presence? Here there is a reciprocity of loyalty.

As we reach adulthood, we begin to look for a mate. How do we decide who is worthy of our loyalty for a lifetime commitment? If we choose well, we marry someone who is kind, loving, sensitive, strong, compassionate, and communicative – someone with whom we can build a true marriage of values. If we make a mistake, we choose someone who has affairs, doesn’t carry his or her share of responsibilities, and isn’t there for our children.

And how do we handle a conflict of loyalties? Our parents want us to study medicine and become a doctor. Our spouse wants us to study law. Our heart tells us our happiness lies with art.

We don’t always know when we first meet a new person how loyal and trustworthy he or she will be. It is only when we feel betrayed that we realize we chose to place our loyalty with someone who didn’t deserve it. Do we stay with this person for the sake of loyalty, or do we leave a relationship where loyalty is not mutual?

What about loyalty to our country? A young man is drafted to fight for his country and trained to kill other young men. In some countries, his only choice is to kill or be killed. Is this the proper place to put his loyalty? Or should he become a conscientious objector? Becoming a conscientious objector may be a far more courageous choice than being loyal to a dictator.

William E. Gladstone wrote, “… in freedom you lay the firmest foundations both of loyalty and order.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Trust your instinct to the end, though you can render no reason.”

Perhaps our first loyalty should be to ourselves and whatever God or Higher Power or Universal Energy we believe in. Be true to yourself and you will be loyal to those people and causes that have earned your loyalty.

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Dr. Janet Smith Warfield serves wisdom-seekers who want understanding and clarity so they can live peaceful, powerful, prosperous lives. Through her unique combination of holistic, creative, right-brain transformational experiences and 22 years of rigorous, left-brain law practice, she has learned how to sculpt words in atypical ways to shift her listeners into experiences beyond words, transforming turmoil into inner peace. To learn more, see www.wordsculptures.com, www.wordsculpturespublishing.com, www.janetsmithwarfield.com

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Two Perspectives on Piercing the Veil of Word Illusions and Creating Our Own Reality

Dr. Amit Nagpal, New Delhi, India, and

Janet Smith Warfield, J.D., Florida, USA

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Dr. Amit Nagpal’s Perspective

Words do not matter. The meanings do. Words are understood in the context in which they are spoken, the tone which is used, the cultural interpretation added, and bias for/against the individual. With all these factors mixed, our personalized meaning of the words is ready. Words are actually a cocktail.

Two words which have always fascinated me are ‘exploitation’ and ‘love’. While the dictionary says exploitation of resources is positive and should be done, the same dictionary says that exploitation of labor is negative and should not be done. Is labor not a resource?

Love is such a glorified word since the languages began that I am scared of using it even in close relationships. Is humanity not basically selfish and incapable of love, the idealized love, we always talk about? I prefer to use the word ‘care’; it does not create unrealistic expectations. The background which the word ‘love’ carries makes me feel that only a spiritually advanced person has the capacity to love. Ordinary mortals like me don’t. What ordinary mortals do is only an exchange of emotional energy, a business. Maybe when you develop the capacity to truly love, you cannot restrict it to family and close relationships. You will be in love with everything around. You will become a Rumi, a Kabir or a Mother Teresa.

Do words wear the veil of illusions or do we human beings add the veils to them? Words only convey approximate meanings. No wonder lawyers have to work so hard at them. After the lawyer has worked for long hours on refining the language, the opposing lawyer finds a loophole to give a totally different meaning to the same words.

Under such a background, do words matter? To me, they don’t. To me what matters is the meaning hidden behind them, the intentions, the feelings, the emotions, the tones and overtones, the vibrations that they carry. To me what matters is the non-verbal part, the honesty which you can see only in the eyes, the genuineness which you can feel only in the smile, the coldness or warmth which you feel in the vibes that they carry, the underpinnings and overtones which tell more about the sincerity than the words themselves.

The more we clear ourselves of negative energy, the more sensitive we become to the subtleties behind the words.  We develop maybe a seventh sense of reading the intentions, listening to the unspoken messages, smelling the vibrations, tasting the warmth or the coldness behind and feeling the touch of the soul (or soullessness) of the entire communication.

Then only can we create our own reality integrating the words with the environment and comprehending the essence of not just the words but the integrated communication.

If my words do not make any sense to you, please sense what is between the lines, between the words, between the alphabets…..

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Dr. Amit Nagpal is a Personal Branding Consultant and specializes in Personal Branding with a holistic touch. He is based in New Delhi, India. His philosophy is, “Take charge of your life and your brand.” To know more about him, click here: http://www.dramitnagpal.co.in/p/about-us.html

Copyright © 2011 – Dr Amit Nagpal. All rights reserved

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Janet Smith Warfield’s Perspective

A Co-Creation Allegory

Imagine you are part of a beautiful moving picture. The picture flows. The story line flows. One scene moves flawlessly into another, and you move with it. You are totally immersed in the flow.

Then suddenly, you bump into a rock or tree or mountain and experience pain. You bump into a monster and experience fear. Your mind wants to understand the pain and fear because you want to control it and stop it. Your mind moves outside the flow and becomes an observer. Your mind has now divided what was once just flow into:

• Flow, and
• You as observer of the flow.

You have eaten of the Tree of Knowledge and been cast out of the Garden of Eden. Your mind has stopped the moving picture at a single frame so you can analyze it, dissect it, understand it, and control it.

Science does this very well. So does orthodox religion. However, each of these is only a single limited understanding within the confines of the single frame they have stopped.

Albert Einstein said, “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”

If everything is a dynamic flow of energy, then each one of us is a minuscule part of that energy, all flowing and connected. Rocks are energy. Trees are energy. Cockroaches are energy. Words are energy.

Our minds can artificially stop the flow to try to understand and control it, but all our minds can truly understand is that one single frame on which we are focusing at a particular moment in time. This is understanding of a sort, but it is only partial understanding. Depending on where we stop the moving film and which frame we look at, the perception, dissection and analysis differ. When our minds hold onto any one single frame, any one set of words or symbols as Truth, we remain divided and separated from the energetic flow. When we allow the energy to flow through us, we tune into all that is and become magnificent co-creators of something much larger than any one of us individually.

To know is to know that we don’t know. We can only co-create.

When we shift our beliefs that words say something about an external reality to beliefs that words, for sure, say something about our perceptions of an external reality, we can choose to shift our perceptions to something that works better for both us and everything around us. We all then return to the dynamic energy flow of the Garden of Eden as conscious co-creators.

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Janet Smith Warfield works with wisdom-seekers who want understanding and clarity so they can live peaceful, powerful, prosperous lives. Through her unique combination of holistic, creative, right-brain transformational experiences and 22 years of rigorous, left-brain law practice, she has learned how to sculpt words in atypical ways to shift her listeners into experiences beyond words, transforming turmoil into inner peace. For more information about Janet, go to www.janetsmithwarfield.com; www.wordsculpturespublishing.com; www.wordsculptures.com.

Copyright © 2011 – Janet Smith Warfield. All rights reserved.