First Step Marketing

The moral and ethical situations that we encounter in both our personal and professional lives are important opportunities for us to choose between fear and its opposite, love. Having the courage of your convictions stems from how much you like _yourself. Before continuing, reflect on the following. On a percentage scale of one to one hundred, how much do you like yourself>

Identifying our fears is usually the easiest part; it is confronting them that is difficult. If we peel back the layers of our fears far enough, we will often discover that their main source lies in our belief that we feel we are not worthy or lovable. A form of ‘honour amongst thieves’ leads us to misguidedly believe that ‘ratting’ on the wrong actions of another is a crime. Speaking up for yourself is not about collaboration with the enemy. Tribal associations of ‘not telling tales’ follow us from school through to social and work dilemmas. In allowing the creation of such fears we directly affect our own self-worth. Indeed, the majority of abuses, physical, emotional or mental, remain unknown, or continue, because of prior conditioning to keep quiet about them. Read the rest of this entry »

Conscience is that part of our consciousness that is vital to our development and growth. However, there is conscience and true conscience. The former is subjective, the latter objective. We often think the function of our subjective, or conditioned, conscience, is to spoil life for those of us who are unlucky enough to be pricked by it. It could be said that ‘your conscience doesn’t keep you from doing anything, it merely keeps you from enjoying it.’ In this guise it can be likened to an irritating acquaintance that you have periodically to tolerate. All too often we construct an entire framework of intelligent rationa-lies-ations in our attempts to justify actions that contradict our deepest sense of right and wrong. Read the rest of this entry »