Seeking Inner Peace
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About this ebook
Personal Fulfillment
Inner peace is happiness of the spirit that results from an absence of anxiety within, it comes from an internal and natural source the soul. Learn how to program your mind for joy in order to live a richer and more complete life of personal fulfillment.
Dr. Nkuts experience and research working with people to cope with life challenges has become a blueprint for spiritual growth. Yet, like all things, one has to be motivated to move forward towards this goal.
Having interviewed hundreds of people on strategies for dealing with difficulties in their lives, Nkut teaches the strategies you need to become a master artist for cultivating inner peace:
generating positive emotions
becoming mentally tough
unleashing your brainpower
developing a sense of purpose
being free from toxic emotions
filling yourself with passion
developing a forgiving spirit
cultivating a joyous feeling
Dr. Nkut is a well-respected entrepreneur, philanthropist, and family physician in Ontario, Canada, and has inspired people to take control of their health so that they lead better lives. His organization, Equity Trust Finance, provides financial assistance and inspiration to people in Cameroon, West Africa.
www.alfrednkut.com
Dr. Alfred Nkut
Dr. Alfred Nkut, M.D., is an accomplished physician, entrepreneur, and philanthropist with avid interest in leadership. His experience has shown him that self-improvement, especially development of character goals, is not emphasized in most formal educational systems. For this reason, he grew increasingly interested in studying, learning, growing, and researching to provide additional insight into the subject of leadership. Dr. Nkut sees every day as an opportunity to add value not only to his own life, but to the lives of others as well. He has also founded the Skylimit Corporation to make a difference in the lives of people, and a financial institution in Cameroon, West Africa with the goal of poverty relief. The more he learns and understands the area of leadership and success, the more passion he has for sharing that knowledge and for encouraging those who wish to improve their lives. He knows of no better way to get a kick out of life than to give, because for him giving is receiving; it is love—and that’s how you make your way to “heaven.” Dr. Nkut and his wife, Dr. Elaine Blacklock, both practice medicine in Greater Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, and are proud to call the city home along with their children Jacob and Ruthie.
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Seeking Inner Peace - Dr. Alfred Nkut
© 2011 Dr. Alfred Nkut. All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.
First published by AuthorHouse 2/3/2011
ISBN: 978-1-4567-4076-4 (e)
ISBN: 978-1-4567-4077-1 (sc)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011905919
Printed in the United States of America
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,
and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1:
How to Generate Positive Emotions
Chapter 2:
How to Become Mentally Tough
Chapter 3:
Unleash Your Brainpower
Chapter 4:
Develop a Sense of Purpose
Chapter 5:
See Yourself Happy
Chapter 6:
Freedom from Toxic Emotions
Chapter 7:
A Future Steeled in Hope
Chapter 8:
Fill Yourself with Passion
Chapter 9:
Develop a Forgiving Spirit
Chapter 10:
Cultivate a Joyous Feeling
This book is dedicated to my wife, Elaine Blacklock, and to our children, Ruthie and Jacob, for their goodness of heart.
Acknowledgments
I extend my deepest thanks to:
Jessica Lachance, my assistant. You are more than an assistant. Thank you for your editorial insight and shared vision.
My brilliant and insightful editors at AuthorHouse.
Daniela Flores, my graphic designer, for the book cover and illustrations. Your work is impeccable.
Introduction
Joy may come from within, but knowing this does not seem to fuel people to try to find it. Why? I wish the answer were simple and could fit into a small box tied with a ribbon; but people are different and seek diverse spiritual paths for personal fulfillment. Because of this, what brings joy to one person may not resonate with another.
Learning how you can raise your level of inner satisfaction is the essence of this book. This book refers to a person’s joy or inner satisfaction as inner peace. It is happiness of the spirit that results from an absence of anxiety within. I think this is true happiness, because it comes from the internal and natural source—the soul. Unlike pleasure, inner peace does not depend on an external source; it is happiness of the body.
My experience and research working with people coping with life challenges are the basis for this book. In my clinic, I have interviewed hundreds of people on how they dealt with difficulties in their lives. After so many interviews, I have the conviction that one does not have to be battered in a storm before learning what to do when faced with one. We build inner strength knowing that challenges come unannounced.
An important aspect to maintaining inner satisfaction is to accept what life sets in front of you, even if you do not like it, because resisting any situation is a surefire recipe for attracting psychological suffering onto oneself. Being motivated and ambitious, and pursuing one’s interests, can be very exciting, especially if you do it for the joy of it and are not motivated by the rat race or a competitive struggle. In order to acquire such a mindset, we have to see every day as a blessing.
I think that seeking inner peace is an essential part of spiritual growth—yet, like all things, we have to be motivated and want to do it.
Master the principles that I will share in this book on how to tap into an inner source of boundless joy, and life will become automatically better.
People can find the keys for becoming master artists in cultivating inner peace. Our power lies in programming our mind for joy. And this can be achieved by following the path that is laid out in this book.
missing image fileChapter 1:
How to Generate Positive Emotions
Everything begins with a thought.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
I first saw Jake at an initial visit for my study and came to know him through many follow-up visits during which interviews were conducted. Jake had worked at the same job for many years. He said that he enjoyed it until his new boss was hired.
His new boss was appointed to a job that was not in the boss’s area of expertise; as such, the responsibility of teaching him the job fell to Jake. Jake had to explain everything to him numerous times and even use pictures to explain certain tasks before the boss could comprehend them. Jake said that he felt like he was talking to a ten-year-old. A real dummy,
he said.
There was hardly any positive experience in Jake’s life, and he rationalized it by blaming the boss for his frustration. He didn’t have anything positive to say about his family—either his spouse or his children. Everything was about him, which was a very self-centered view of life. He thought that if everybody could just change, his life would become better. He told me that his love for life and interests would return if those conditions were met.
After many visits with Jake, I realized that I was not getting anywhere; we had not made much progress toward making him happier. Therefore, I suggested therapy sessions with a great psychologist who focused on helping people who wanted to be happier. Unfortunately, the many sessions of therapy did not seem to change Jake’s level of happiness. He was still very bored and gloomy about life. His get-up-and-go attitude was still lost.
One day, Jake came to see me because he was feeling low. He had a new story to tell me about how miserable he was feeling. He had a long list of new problems, and he still felt that the reason for his unhappiness was the world around him: If people would just become a little bit reasonable, life would be better.
If his grandchildren would just behave, he would feel much better. His attitude had not changed.
It was during another interview with Jake that he opened my mind about how he was feeling . At the end of the session, I noticed that he had not mentioned the issues with his new boss once during the whole interaction. This was very unusual because it had been his standard issue for some time. Because of this, I posed the question, How is your boss doing?
He hesitated. It seemed he was trying to conceal that his boss had passed away, which, for me, begged the question, why was he not feeling better?
He passed away,
Jake said with pause. I mean this man was a very good man.
He did not say it in such a way as to suggest that it was good that the boss had passed away. He said it with a sigh of regret.
I asked about the cause of the boss’s unfortunate passing. It was a sudden death of unknown cause. And, many months after he had died, Jake’s unhappiness did not improve.
I interviewed many people with stories similar to Jake’s, but his grabbed my attention. Why, despite the passing of Jake’s boss, did his level of happiness not improve? It speaks to how irrational emotions can be.
This observation is further compounded by the people that I interviewed who had very similar negative life circumstances but were living a life of personal fulfillment and satisfaction while others were not. What could be the reason for the difference, I wondered.
The common denominator in a good number of those situations was that they all had a victim mentality—they all thought that they were defenseless in one way or another. The explanation for their feelings of unhappiness was not from within, but from outside influences—the world!
Jake hardly sees himself as a winner. No. He sees himself as losing, whether it is about the present or the past. He sees limitations, not the possibilities that victors see. He minimizes all the good that has happened in his life and magnifies all the negative experiences.
Despite the fact that Jake has kept a very good job for many years, he still sees himself as merely getting by financially.
Two main reasons seemed to explain the apparent contradiction observed over time in Jake. First, he did not have the ability to cope with life challenges. Second, he wrongly identified with his apparent setback, which was the falling out with his boss; he let it consume his entire life. He did not have the stomach to digest adversity, which is an important quality needed for staying happy, because, sooner or later, we all come across something that we do not like in life.
He did not have the ability to generate positive emotions either. This is paramount in making oneself happy, and it is explained in detail throughout this book. Many elements are involved with maintaining inner peace in our lives. Self-image is the key, because self-image is the anchor of emotions. Our image flows from our thoughts, and the thoughts that we harbor emanate from our identity.
Self-Image
In order to understand how to generate positive emotions, you must understand how they are related to image. We all have a picture of ourselves in our minds. This self-image is either positive or negative, depending on our internal dialogue. A negative internal dialogue generates a negative self-image, whereas a positive internal dialogue gives a positive self-image.
Why is self-image so important? Motivational speaker and author Bob Proctor provides the best explanation. He describes thoughts such as