How To Change Your Life

                    By bayo Ogunmupe
    There is a law in psychology that if you form a picture in your mind of what you would like to be, and you keep and hold that picture there long enough, soon enough, you will become exactly as you have been thinking. Which is why you deserve everything you can rightfully earn by doing an excellent job, producing and distributing products or services that improve people's lives and work. Therefore, you should dedicate yourself to serving others. In a market economy like ours, all transactions are voluntary, driven by the profit- motive. People buy goods if only they are going to gain.  You can therefore be successful in the long run if only you can provide the things people want. The greater you serve the people, the more you deserve their loyalty and gain.
    The 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln once said, "The very best way to help the poor, isn't to become one of them." By making a lot of money, you make a significant contribution to the welfare of the people. Your mind can only hold one thought at a time. You should apply this law, by deliberately thinking positively whenever you want to cancel out a thought or feeling that makes angry or unhappy. However, the law of habit says: "Any action that you repeat over and over becomes a new habit." By using your willpower and repetition, you can become a completely positive person and change your life.
    A major cause of negative emotion, according to the Russian esotericist teacher Pyotr Demianovich Ouspensky, in his book: In Search of the Miraculous, is attachment. This occurs when you take something personally or become attached to a person or thing. The great spiritual teachers such as Buddha, jesus and mohammed have emphasised the importance of separating yourself emotionally from the situation, in order to regain your calmness and composure. The U.S psychology philosopher, William James of Harvard wrote: "The first step in dealing with any difficulty is to be willing to have it so." He encouraged people to say, "What cannot be cured must be endured." In other words practice detachment from any situation that makes you upset.
    Nothing or no one has any control over you unless there is something you still want from them. As soon as you detach your emotions from a person or object, you are free from his control. The ability to detach yourself from others is a power you can develop through practice. It can make you the master of a situation that might otherwise cause you to become upset and angry. Psychologists say everything we do is to increase our self esteem and sense of personal value. The fact is that most people are preoccupied with themselves and their problems. The person who cuts you off in the traffic is so involved with his own thoughts, that he is not even aware of your existence. It would have been silly to become angry over his thoughtless action.
    You should set your own sails.  Never do or refrain from doing anything because you are concerned about what people might think about you. The fact is that nobody is even thinking about you. In the American sociologist, Abraham Maslow's studies of self actualising people, those two percent of men and women who are fully mature, he found a particular quality that they all possess in common. They were completely honest with themselves. They did not hope or pretend that they were other than they were. This self acceptance was the cornerstone of their self esteem and self respect. Because they knew what they were, they weren't overly influenced by the approval of other people. You should do the same. You should do things to earn the respect of those you respect.
    Exceptional people strive to live up to the ideals of people whose respect is of the greatest value to them. In a study of successful men, researchers found that these people were avid readers of biographies and autobiographies when they were young. An important decision you make as you grow is to model yourself after a specific person whose respect is of the utmost value to you. After making such a choice, you can then organize your life to earn their respect. Modeling has been used as a powerful tool to develop personalities throughout history. This is why in the military, heroic acts of ancient commanders are taught as part of the curriculum. This is to encourage soldiers, sailors, and airmen to think and cat like them.
    The people you admire and take as your model has an inordinate influence on you think and act. Which is why Ludwig Erhard is my model. If I were in another epoch I might have chosen to be a Buddha or a Leonardo. But in this poverty ravaged Nigeria, I would wish to create a welfare state in the manner Erhard pulled off an economic miracle in Germany between 1949 and 1977.It was because of Erhard I made political economy a major area of my study since 1978. Ludwig Wilhelm Erhard was a German economist and statesman who was notable as the architect of the German post-war economic miracle as Minister of Economics under Konrad Adenauer after 1949. He was Chancellor of Germany from 1963 until 1966.
     Born in bavaria in february 1897, from 1913 to 1916, he was a commercial apprentice. later, he worked in his father's draper's shop as a salesman. He served in World War 1 as an artillery man, fought in Romania and was seriously wounded in 1918. Since he could no longer work as a draper, he started the study of Economics, receiving his doctorate in 1925. Then he married Luise Lotter Schuster in Frankfurt in 1923. He moved to his home town Furth as an executive in his father's company. Later, he became the deputy director of a marketing research Institute.
     Owing to his injuries, Erhard wasn't drafted for combat in World War 11. Instead he worked on concepts for a post war peace. In his 1944 study, Erhard assumed that Germany had already lost the war; thereby endorsing efforts to effect an economic revival for post war Germany. After the war he became economic consultant to the American administrators of Bavaria who made him minister of Economics. In 1948, he was elected director of economics of West Germany. In June, he introduced the Deutsche Mark, abolishing price fixing, measures which exceeded his authority but which succeeded in revolutionizing the economy.
     By September 1949, Chancellor Konrad Adenauer appointed him Minister of Economics. His party made his concept of social market economy part of the party platform. His party's victory made the economy evolve into the welfare state. Erhard's policies proved widely popular as the economy made a miraculous recovery to rapid growth and widespread prosperity, overcoming wartime destruction and successfully integrating millions of refugees from East Germany. Adenauer retired in 1963 paving the way for Erhard to succeed him as federal chancellor. He was reelected chancellor in 1965.
     Though the Erhard approach won German reunification, in 1966, led by Minister Walter Scheel, the Free Democrats broke up the coalition with Erhard in the aftermath of the recession. Erhard thereafter resigned. He was succeeded by his party man Kurt Kiesinger who led a grand coalition. Erhard remained a member of Parliament until his death in May 1977. he was honored with a university named for him.