Motivational Quotes for Emotional & Mental Happiness

Inspirational Quotes to Improve Emotional and Mental Health 

What you are and who you are today is not necessarily what you ought to become.

In fact, it is almost assuredly not so. Otherwise, you would have no room for further growth and development, nor any need for further human experiences. 

Success in Living A Determined Life comes mostly through developing a deeper self-understanding and honing your "inner talk" skills and the conversations you hold with yourself. This also requires you to know, understand, and accept the reality of the way you are at any given point in time, starting with now. 

Once you fully know yourself, you are better able to be true to who you truly are by striving to become what your soul wants you to be across all elements of your. This is the path to emotional and mental happiness. 

We all occasionally struggle with controlling our emotions and dealing with down periods in our lives. It is not possible to always be emotionally up and mentally strong. And we all need motivational pointers to help us overcome our emotional weights and negative thoughts. That's why we wrote 365 Motivational Quotes for Emotional & Mental Happiness. 

Here are some of our favorite quotations you'll find in the book:

Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow.

Swedish Proverb

Guilt is anger directed at ourselves.

Peter McWilliams

Loving people live in loving world. Hostile people live in a hostile world. Same world.

Wayne Dyer

He who angers you conquers you.

Elizabeth Kenny

Life reflects your own thoughts back to you.

Napoleon Hill

We can always choose to perceive things differently. You can focus on what's wrong in your life, or you can focus on what's right.

Marianne Williamson

Any person capable of angering you becomes your master; they can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by them.

Epictetus

Make it a rule of life never to regret. Regret is an appalling waste of energy — you can't build on it; it's only for wallowing in.

Katherine Mansfield 

The motivational quotations in this book will provide you with a wealth of beliefs and ideas for overcoming emotional and mental challenges, enabling you to live a life framed through self-awareness, mindfulness, authentic happiness, being present, peace and peacefulness, love, attaining goals, and being connected with your spiritual self. 

Project You: 365 Motivational Quotes for Emotional & Mental Happiness is available on Amazon in paperback ($4.88) and Kindle ($2.99) formats. 

Self Awareness and Success -- Part 1

Emotional Self Control Leads to Greater Success and Outcomes

While greatness does not automatically emanate from self awareness, those who have achieved greatness in any area of life tend to have a deep sense of self awareness. They have not passed themselves by without wondering.

On the other hand, perhaps greatness can be born through a highly elevated sense of self awareness. As Carl Jung wrote, "Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes."

Of course, self awareness is only one pillar creating the foundation for greatness. In the words of Lord Tennyson, "Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control ── these three alone lead to sovereign power."

Whatever emotional state you are in will dictate your behavior. This can be both a positive and a negative thing, depending on your emotional state.

By being aware of your emotional state, and thus giving you an opportunity to control this state, you prevent yourself from just having to accept and take whatever the world dishes out to you. 

You control how events and people impact you, simply by controlling how you feel and think about these events and people.

Here's what two people from opposite ends of the literary spectrum have said on this subject:

Nothing has any power over me other than that which I give it through my conscious thoughts.  ~Anthony Robbins

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. ~William Shakespeare

 Your emotional and social states are closely tied together, for the emotional side of your life will be primarily (though not exclusively) created, developed and troubled by your relationships with others.

An inability to notice true feelings as they are occurring leaves you at their mercy. There is a crucial difference between being caught up in a feeling and being aware that a feeling is about to sweep you away through what Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence, aptly calls "an emotional hijacking."

As Goleman points out, emotional self-control, such as delaying gratification and stifling impulsiveness, often leads to greater success and outcomes.

This article is excerpted from the Amazon top-seller Project You: Living A Determined Life, available in paperback and Kindle formats. 

Your Conscience and Self Awareness

Your conscience plays a key role in your quest for self awareness. Some might equate the conscience to one's self awareness, but in fact they are two separate aspects of the inner self.

Self awareness is being conscious of your feelings, emotions and thoughts; whereas your conscience evaluates your feelings, emotions and thoughts and assigns judgmental scores or values to them.

For example, you may want to cry about something that has happened. Your self-awareness abilities will help you identify all the emotions, thoughts and feelings that are combining to cause the tears that are about to burst forth (a physical response to your mental, emotional and spiritual components). Your conscience, on the other hand, will judgmentally tell you whether crying in this instance is right or wrong, appropriate or inappropriate, if the crying should take place in public or privately, and the "correct" length of time allowed for the shedding of your tears.

In many ways, strong self awareness (and strong self understanding) requires an ability to keep one's conscience in check so that your true feelings, emotions and thoughts are allowed to surface unhindered. After all, if you want to cry, go ahead and cry. Why should your conscience prevent you from experiencing an innermost feeling? In fact, such inhibitions may be detrimental to the full development of your spirit (i.e. the real you).

Stephen R. Covey, the legendary author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, wrote in his later work First Things First, "One of the most powerful uses of self-awareness is to become aware of conscience and how it works within us."

As the Polish proverb goes, "Conscience is the voice of the soul." And in most cases you will want to listen to that voice.

But your conscience is, unfortunately, also formed by the lessons taught to you by your parents, teachers, societal rules, and the cultural customs, norms and practices in which you were raised.

As a result, your true conscience (that true voice of your soul) will at times be in conflict with the one shaped and formed by these other outside influences. This is when you know (instinctively and deep down) that something is not right, but that you cannot prevent or change it.

The more in tune you are with your inner self, and the closer you are to being driven by self actualization (refer to Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs), the less likely you are to compromise your principles or trample on your values.

Shame, one of the worst personal feelings one can have, arises from the fear or realization that one's actions have not been in accordance with one's true inner self. Do not be afraid to not live up to the expectations (or rules) of others. The rules and expectations of others are unlikely to power your dreams and desires. Instead, be afraid of failing to live up to your own expectations and to your own principles, values, morals, rules, and ethics.

Here are two quotes from Marcus Aurelius, the 2nd Century Roman Emperor, that reinforce these last two points:

You can change your beliefs so they empower your dreams and desires. Create a strong belief in yourself and what you want.

He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with the universe.

 

This article is excerpted from the book Project You: Living A Determined Life, available in both paperback and eBook formats at Amazon.com.