My Virtual Reading Room

Beneath your burdensome regrets and who you think you are through the lens of past mistakes, there is someone beautiful who wants to emerge. You are not your mistakes and your mistakes are not you. You are so much more than your mistakes. Allow your truth to emerge. Your truth cannot emerge buried under a mountain of guilt and regret. Your past is like a bag of bricks; set it down and walk away. Quit collecting every painful word, memory and mistake. Collect hope. Hope is lighter.
— Bryant McGill

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The way you see yourself will often determine how people see you.
— Paulo Coelho
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Working hard is good, but getting things done is better. Look to see how you are spending your day. Are you accomplishing anything? Is it anything that matters? You have only so much time here. Don't waste it. If you are really putting in a lot of effort, but not getting much done that matters, take a look at that. That's all I'm saying. Take a look.
—Neale Donald Walsch
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Live in the present, or die in your past; it's your choice.
— Bryant McGill

If you want to be happy you must become a happiness seeker. You have to think about happiness, look for the happiness, seize the happiness and believe with all of your heart that you deserve happiness.
— Bryant McGill

People often say they just want peace and happiness. You hear it from people all the time, "I just want to be happy." But really, they don't want to be happy. It's a flat-out lie or a delusion. If they wanted happiness they would have it. The truth is, we have what we want already. I know you will be tempted to blame everything outside of yourself for your woes, but it just isn't true. Sure, it's true that there is ugliness "out there" but happiness is absolutely something inside of you. If you are waiting for things in your life to align themselves so you can be happy, then you are cruisin' for a bruisin'. Looking to the external for happiness is like a hardcore drug addiction; you are always looking for a fix to soothe your withdrawals of depression when things aren't going well. Look, if you aren't happy, it's because you simply don't want to be. The mentally ill and small children aside, you are responsible for your own happiness. Don't act pathetic, pitiful and helpless. You have choices even when you have limiting beliefs that you don't. How long are you going to keep waiting for happiness to come your way? I guess you're waiting for happiness to knock your door down and drag you out of your x-year-long streak of "bad luck". You may live in a harsh world at times, but you can have a beautiful inner-life, and a beautiful outer-life always begins with a beautiful inner-life.

Many have said that happiness is an inside job, but be sure to put some emphasis on the word "job." First, accept that you have responsibility in your own happiness. Stop blaming the world, your past, bad luck or other people. Accept the fact that you have some power and choices in your life. Then begin to use your power and choices. Happiness takes practice. It starts with deciding that such a thing even exists, or can exist for you. Then you have to decide that you should have some. Then you have to start looking for it. Chances are that you have opportunities for happiness right under your nose that you haven't even noticed. When we become open to happiness and more mindful, we begin to notice happiness in moments. Happiness is not a permanent state. Happiness is not a thing we achieve. We do not find the secret to happiness and then everything is just great. Happiness comes in moments between sad moments and everyday ordinary moments. Happiness is there for you to notice and reach for and touch. Empowerment is often little more than noticing what was once unnoticed and finding what was always there. If you want to be happy you must become a happiness seeker. You have to think about happiness, look for the happiness, seize the happiness and believe with all of your heart that you deserve happiness.

Many people think they want to accomplish what other successful people have in life. They see the worldly achievements, but seldom consider that many such achievements are constructs of the false world.

They believe they want those things, and when they focus on them, to their bewilderment, those very things move out of their reach. My version of success is that my life is full, purposeful, beautiful and boundless.

I attribute this success to my spirituality, good health, and community of positive relationships which have all come to me, as a creation of choice. Success comes from finding your center and self.

You see, being yourself in a world which wants you to be someone else, is the highest possible attainment. I own my time and command the space of my beingness — a space where I am allowed to grow into my true, unique nature. Success is a spiritual process, not a worldly one; that is to say it is an internal process, and not external. It is a process of peeling off the layers of conditioning, becoming your essential truth, and living the inner-life.

Success is therefore a process of honesty and oftentimes, also courage.

— Bryant McGill

No external thing or person is ever coming to you, which will make you happy or complete you. As long as you are waiting for something to make you happy — happiness will never come. Expectancy creates disappointment. Chasing the external to achieve joy is a death-trap for personal-development. The external only creates dependency. The foundation of joyful independence is being content with yourself; self-love. You're the one you've been looking for; you complete you. Recognize that you are enough, and that all external gifts are simply extra blessings. Praise first the mighty blessing of yourself! Find your own joy within and then greater joy will be added to you.
— Bryant McGill



"Let go of your painful past. Love lives in the present."
— Bryant McGill

You have to make the decision to let go of the past if you want to move forward. Reliving your painful past will poison your heart and your tomorrow. If you look at today through the eyes of the past, you can never see what the present moment has to offer. Beating yourself up over every perceived mistake is the work of an internal abuser who must be restrained and reformed. The past is inaccessible. Almost all sadness comes from thinking about the past, and all worry from thinking about the future — present-mindedness is your only safe haven. Only in the present is your mind free to do what it does best — solve problems. The easiest way to leave the past behind is to remember that love does not live in the past, only memories — love lives in the present.

The way you see yourself will often determine how people see you.
— Paulo Coelho
~~
Working hard is good, but getting things done is better. Look to see how you are spending your day. Are you accomplishing anything? Is it anything that matters? You have only so much time here. Don't waste it. If you are really putting in a lot of effort, but not getting much done that matters, take a look at that. That's all I'm saying. Take a look.
—Neale Donald Walsch
~~
Live in the present, or die in your past; it's your choice.
— Bryant McGill

Blame anchors us into the past; a place we cannot change. Acceptance frees us to the future.
— Bryant McGill
~~
People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built.
--Eleanor Roosevelt
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Sure. You want to be touched, inspired and made to feel alive. But a relationship is like a bridge where you meet other people half-way. That means if you want to be touched, inspired and made to feel alive, you have to be touching, inspiring and bring the fire of your aliveness to the union of your companionship.


Being alone will show you who you really are, and if you cannot get-on positively as the sole master of your space in that room alone, then you can absolutely forget about it after you add another person.


People have some really crazy ideas about love, friends and relationships. They have the absurd belief that their friends, children, family, lovers and companions can make them happy.
— Bryant McGill

("People think being alone makes you lonely, but I don't think that's true. Being surrounded by the wrong people is the loneliest thing in the world."
~Kim Culbertson)
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Some people run from pain their whole lives, and what pain they do not digest they inflict upon others.
— Bryant McGill
~~~
When someone is vicious towards you, they are giving you a glimpse of the pain they carry in themselves.
--Bryant McGill

( (same quote in text form) )

You will never make people happier than by being a happy person yourself.

Get this through your head — you are not responsible for other people's happiness.

— Bryant McGill

The best way to be happy in your own life:

STOP comparing it to others.

(J.V. Manning)

You are so much more than your mistakes.
— Bryant McGill

Your unresolved issues will continue to call-in experiences to teach you what you need to learn.

— Bryant McGill