Next up in the list of the 12 most important philosophical questions to answer for yourself:

What is the ideal relationship between the individual and the state?

Finally, my opportunity to give you an earful of my political views…..

One of the follow up questions to this one is “Is the individual there to serve the state or the state there to serve the individual?”

I believe that regardless of the relationship between the state and the individual, in the end, it is about service.

The state serves its citizens.

The citizens serve the state.

When it comes to thinking about how we should interact with others, whether collectively in the form of the state or individually, we should start from a desire to serve.

When we humble ourselves enough to think of others first and how we might serve them, that’s when the magic happens. That’s when happiness and success begin to bloom.

Look for and take the opportunity to serve when it presents itself. You won’t be disappointed.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Next up in the list of important questions from philosophy for us to answer:

What is the “good life”?

Too bad it isn’t an election year, otherwise we would get the answer to this one every night on TV. (My attempt at a joke.)

As we look at what our goals should be, this one is probably the mostly directly applicable.

Defining the good life for ourselves gives us something to aim for. Something to visualize and create for ourselves.

Some things to think about as we define this for ourselves:

Where do you want to live?

What kind of home do you want?

What kind of family life do you want?

What kinds of leisure activities do you want to be doing?

Where do you want to be spending your time?

I am of the belief that each of us get to answer these questions for our self. As we answer these questions for our self, we don’t get to judge the answers others have chosen.

Our answers will determine our goals. We must set our sights on our version of the good life.

Now would be a good time to review your goals for this year and compare them against your answers to the questions about your good life. Need to make any adjustments?

Make it a great day.

Jake

Next up in the list of important questions to answer to determine our own philosophy:

What is happiness?

This one is easy. I just looked up the definition and found this:

State of well-being characterized by emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy.

Actually, I think this question is best answered by thinking about a follow up question. Why is that the same things can happen to two different people and one is happy and the other is not?

Which one are you?

We all have the choice as we walk along life’s path every day. We can choose happiness or we can choose not to be happy.

If you aren’t happy, ask yourself why.

Do you not believe that happiness is out there for you?

Do you believe life to be one of struggle and pain?

Do you let future worries weigh you down today?

Do you let the past drag you down today?

I like how the definition of happiness starts at contentment.

We can start to add happiness to our lives simply by content with what we have. Then we pursue greater levels of happiness.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Next up in the list of 12 questions from philosophy:

What is good and what is bad?

How we define good, bad, right and wrong definitely has an influence on how our lives will turn out.

I won’t attempt to help you draw the line between right and wrong, that is for each of us to do by ourselves.

Instead, I wanted to share Jake’s 51% rule.

At any given time the world is at least 51% good.

Regardless of how you define good and bad, good always wins because the world is always (at a minimum) a little bit more good than bad.

My favorite part of this rule is that good has already won. That takes all the pressure off. All we have to do now is to run up the score. Try and get up as close to 100% as possible.

What can you do today to add another percent to the good column?

Make it a great day.

Jake

JD – Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment. – Jim Rohn

EB – The most important quality I look for in a teammate is accountability. You have to be accountable for who you are. It’s easy to blame things on someone else. – Lenny Wilkens

JM – Alcohol and calculus don’t mix. Never drink and derive.

JW – Our nature consists of motion, complete rest is death. – Blaire Pascal

Accountability…..maybe a bad word in some circles.

When someone else holds us accountable, most of us (or is it just me) tend to get a bit defensive.

As I get older, I am realizing more and more a profound truth: the world does not revolve around me. (I know, you should probably have to pay to receive this kind of genius)

Since the world doesn’t revolve around me, it becomes important that I understand and appreciate what other people have to offer.

And part of what others offer is a different view on myself. Being accountable to someone else isn’t about submitting your will to theirs or about them being “better” than you.

It is about taking a more objective look at yourself in order to become the best you possible.

If you want to do your best, embrace accountability.

Think of the most important goal in your life right now. Find someone to hold you accountable to make forward progress.

Make it a great weekend.

Jake

http://youtu.be/aRLOCNKKZDY

Don’t worry about a thing, cause every little thing is gonna be alright.

What a great way to look at all the little worries in our lives.

When it comes to worry, we have a choice.

We can let it in and let it drive our actions and thoughts or we can choose to just not worry.

Most of the worries in our lives aren’t worth the mental energy we expend on them.

Next time a worry pops up, just let the lyrics and melody of this song remind you that everything is going to be alright.

Make it a great day.

Jake

Next up in the list of the top 12 philosophical questions to ask yourself:

Are we living in the Matrix?

Ok, maybe I took a little creative liberty with that one. This question revolves around what is truth and what is reality and how we can know truth and reality.

This is another one of those brain busters where I am not qualified to give the correct answer.

My answer to this question is to focus on those things that I know produce a positive result.

To love and treat others as I would like to be treated.

To live a life of service to others.

To seek knowledge and wisdom.

Even if we are living in the Matrix and it is all a big sham, if we have done these things we will have had a better experience along the way.

And as you look to answer this and the other questions posed in this series, you must answer them for yourself.

We may not get to face the choice of the red pill and the blue pill, but we can choose what we focus on.

Make it a great day.

Jake

The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate. – Oprah Winfrey

Today is our daughter Annie’s 4th birthday so I thought I deviate from answering the top 12 questions of philosophy.

Birthdays and anniversaries are great reminders of those wonderful blessings and miracles in our lives. They remind me of the little green mile markers along the interstate, marking our progress along the way.

They remind us of where we came from and where we are going.

They are also days of celebration.

The quote above reminded me that celebrating life is something we can do every day.

If you really think about it, every day probably is an anniversary or commemorative date of some wonderful thing that has happened in your life.

We just need to decide to celebrate them.

What are you celebrating today?

Make it a great day (that way you will have something to celebrate next year).

Jake

Next up in the list of 12 most important philosophical questions to ask yourself:

What is thought? Is it real?

Again, I am not going to try to answer this one “correctly”, merely from the perspective of what I think might yield the most positive attitude.

Thoughts are the beginning of all that is real.

A lot of what we see and experience began as a thought or an idea in someone’s mind.

And our thoughts shape our lives.

Earl Nightingale said it best in “The Strangest Secret”. We become what we think about most of the time.

If what we become determines our happiness, then we must take control of our thoughts use them to shape our future.

If we want different results, we must have different thoughts.

And in these thoughts we will find a future filled with all the possibilities inherent in the world of thought.

Virtually anything becomes possible.

Just think of what is possible for you….

Make it a great day.

Jake

Next up in the list of 12 most important questions asked in philosophy:

What determines the life and fate of each individual? Do we really have free will or is life set up before we even start?

This one is tough for me to answer from even an attempt at impartiality. I am such a believer in our ability to exert our free will that imagining life without it is very difficult for me.

We control our thoughts and our attitude and nothing else.

We don’t need to ask for a different set of circumstances in our life. If we would like a different result, we must change our attitude and our thoughts.

“But you have no idea of the disappointments in my life.”

Disappointments are not something special reserved for the poor and downtrodden. Those who have rolled the dice of fate and came up empty.

Disappointments happen to us all. Our happiness is determined in our response, not in what happens to us.

Take today to think about your own life. What could you focus on instead of the negative happenings?

Make it a great day.

Jake