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First off, I would like to congratulate you for picking up this book! This can only mean one thing, you are ready to act.

You are finally entertaining the idea of earning the extra commission that you are worth. You acknowledged the struggle that you are going through should earn you more than what it is now. You are ready to take the extra miles with your online business.

Above all, you are motivated to take all the necessary actions for your online marketing success. You are ready to take action to upgrade your Internet marketing business.

2.0 How To Get Started

We all know that the concept of affiliate marketing is simple: we are selling products or services for others. And of course, we are doing the marketing campaign for other vendors’ products to be sold to the public. In other words, it gives us the avenue to earn commissions through promoting other peoples or companies’ products.

We all started out by choosing a product we like or rewarding. We then promote it in the most efficient way we can and make a sizable profit for our efforts. But in the end of the day, the most important and truly rewarding part of affiliating is when a sale is made. That’s right folks, our long hard earn commission!

Essentially, it is a performance-based marketing. I’m sure you agree with me on this one; ‘how much you earn as an affiliate to the vendor corresponds to your sales’. If you were to make a lot of sales, then you’ll earn a big amount of commission. If not, however, you won’t earn as much.

That is why we must remember: we will only be commissioned when a sale is made through the link we provide. We will not be commissioned for sales that were made from other links.

But I know what you are thinking, you’ve done all that and yet it’s not enough, isn’t it? You would probably be wondering about the extra commission you can earn that will double, no, triple your commission!

Truth about maximizing your commission is that, it’s not as simple as it sounds, but it’s also not as difficult as you’d think.

3.0 Why Affiliate Marketing

Through affiliate marketing, you are able to accomplish three things for three different people.

First, you are making yourself feel good for earning a commission. Second, you’re helping a company or other people to gain new customers that they don’t already have. Finally, you are making a new satisfying experience to your customers. They would discover a product from you that can really be helpful and desirable.

Let’s make it clear. Our expenses doing affiliate doesn’t have to be expensive and complicated. In fact, it can be done quickly with a profitable outcome. You don’t need for a big email list to drive traffic to the offer and a huge budget.

So, without having to need those things, what should you have to make extra commissions from affiliate marketing? Personally, I would say a sense of creativity and a good work ethic will take you a long way when you apply them to the proper strategies.

The thing about affiliate is how we don’t have to make our own products for this business to run. Yes, you know that you don’t have to go through the trouble of actually coming up with ideas and the labor of producing something. Instead, you’ll be selling other people’s products.

You are, in short, an online sales agent. Your main task is to make sales but to do so, you have to be creative with your approach to your potentials. That is why on further chapters, I will break down the steps you need, to scout for the potential killer products!

On another note, you don’t have to provide customer support for the products you sell. All enquiries or complaints will be directed to the product’s vendor. The vendor is responsible for its products and customer care. They will bear the brunt and grunts if anything goes wrong.

However, should that happen, your reputation and credibility would be affected too, but not as severe as the vendors. I’m sure some of us have gone through this experience at some point. So, always keep that in mind.

What’s more, most of us neglect even the very basics of affiliate skills when we first started. So, what are those mistakes you’ve been doing all this while that you are unaware of? These could be the very reason why you can’t seem reach the breakthrough you’ve always wanted for your commission.

The thing that you could’ve been doing unknowingly is not building your own mailing list. This is an exceptional no! Your buyers’ list is the very foundation of your affiliate marketing endeavor. It is the very basic of it all and you should always regard it with the highest importance.

You might think I’m joking but there are some of us who neglect the need to follow-up with their list!

Another folly of a common affiliate marketer is not knowing how to generate traffic at its fullest. You have your own way of doing this, of course, but are you truly maximizing the number of potential that you should have been generating?

Facebook, Google AdWords, Solo Ads and many others are only some example of the methods of making traffic. Even I must admit, traffic generating method is far more intricate than what it is thought to be. But do not fret. If you stay towards the end of this book, I will show you some of my free traffic hack for you to increase the number of traffic and eventually your commission!

So, the next common mistakes most of us have been doing; investing without making profit. Marketing involves a lot of effort from you and that takes a long time. Finding your target audience and coming up with ways to approach them requires a lot of work on your end.

An inexperienced affiliate would engage in an advertising campaign with limited knowledge of its inner workings, and, naturally, would lose more money than they gain. Do not take too much time looking up on the best product that you want!

I realized back when I first started; constant search for a so called ‘best product’ that even I don’t even know its true criteria, takes too much of my time. Before I know it, I just missed multiple opportunities that I should’ve been taking before! How frustrating is that?

But you are in luck! I will show you how to ‘spy’ the market to look up for the best product you can promote using only JVZoo.com. Before you do just that, time for you to be introduced to a certain Super Affiliate.

4.0 Super Affiliate Mindset

And the Super Affiliate is you! If, you follow through the lesson I’m about to lay down in this section of course. So, what exactly is this ‘Super Affiliate’? No, it doesn’t involve in getting bitten by a radioactive affiliate or become one with the Force through extreme training.

It’s a next-level affiliate who earn his highest earnings!

Fact is, no affiliate will earn the same amount of commission and payout.

The exact number of sales of a product is unpredictable, which means the exact commission earn by all affiliate will differ. That’s for sure.

I also cannot guarantee you success. That is up to you. On your end, you need to give your 100%. You need to be positive and efficient. Attitude will be your drive to success.

You must be thinking, “Oh great, he is going to go ‘Yoda’ on us like: to always believe in the Force or the Force won’t come to your aid”. I get it, what you want is the real methods to implement right now. Yes, I get all that. But the truth is, the way you think about affiliate now affects whether or not you will succeed.

Let us do a brief recap for a moment. Think about why you bought this book in the first place. I strongly believe it’s because you want to earn that extra, desired commission you always wanted.

You did not say to yourself “It’s so hard to increase my commission” or “I think I should just keep earning normal commission. I still earn something anyway” when you pick up this book, right?

You are here because you know, your mind did not allow you to think like that. This caused a certain ‘Force’ in the very depths of your mind to become problem solvers. Especially surrounding issues that would have normally been ‘too hard’ to be dealt with for regular affiliates.

See, Master Yoda is right all along.

5.0 The ‘C.R.A.F.T.’ Strategy

To be the desirable Super Affiliate every prospects and subscribers go to, I personally suggest you implement the C.R.A.F.T strategy. This is the Force that you need to maintain when affiliating! It helps me earn the extra commission, and I have no doubt it will do the same to you.

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Introduction

Email marketing helps businesses see instant sales from existing customers, but more importantly, it maintains and builds long-lasting relationships with loyal customers - which are the core of most successful businesses. Despite the business benefits of email marketing, many businesses are either still not using it or they are under-utilizing its power. If you’re already marketing via email, this guide provides useful tips to improve the results of your email campaigns and ideas to build long-term relationships with loyal customers. For those of you who haven’t started email marketing, you’ll learn how to do it efficiently and effectively in the right way!

Sending email is a fun and rewarding experience. You know how awesome it is when people comment on your Facebook posts or respond to a tweet? Well, email newsletters are better with a greater reach! Don't lose sight that this is all supposed to be something you enjoy and hopefully grow to love.
Chapter 1: What Is Email Marketing?

Email marketing, it is a business tool that enables you to communicate with your staff, your suppliers and your customers by sending out emails. When considering a definition for email marketing, there are a number of ways to define it from the broad to the specific. Here are some key components to what a successful email marketing campaign does:

Direct Email – Emails that are directly to current and potential customers
Retention Email – Frequent and regular emails are sent to current customers
Email Placed Ads – Marketing ads are placed within emails sent by others
Let’s look further at each of these components.

Direct Emails

It is a call to action on the part of the customer. Let’s say you receive an email from a business. You may or may not have heard of them, and you may have never signed up for any of their email lists. Business can obtain these lists by buying them. Either way, the business sees you as a potential customer and wants to entice you with a good deal. You may even have done business with them before and they want to do business once more by offering something you might be interested or a better deal than before. The purpose of direct emails is to be promotional. They might offer you a product or service, or they ask you to sign up for something. Potential customers are more likely to get these types of emails.

Retention Emails

Retention emails are the equivalent of printed newsletters. While still promotional in nature, retention emails attempt to retain customer loyalty by offering the customer something. This could range anywhere from coupons to up-to-date news on the latest products. These types of emails are sent out on a regular basis. It could be a weekly or monthly basis, but usually the business tries to send out emails weekly to retain customer interest.

Email Placed Ads

Another way to do email marketing is to get some advertisement space within another email. Many times, business that send out retention emails reserve space for other business to place their advertisement. This can be beneficial for you as a business, especially if you have studied the demographic that you are marketing to and the potential customers you could gain. Knowing what other types of businesses you potential customers go to and listen to, is a great advantage because it allows you to strategically place your ads in emails and to get clicks. It is also a benefit for the business with which you have an ad placed because they will know that their emails are being read and they can also do a bit analytics work to determine where their customers are clicking.

Does Email Marketing Works?

Simply out, yes, email marketing works. Of course, there is the stigma of SPAM that keeps people wondering whether or not email marketing is still effective. Email marketing, just like other forms of Internet marketing such as social media marketing, it is fast paced and must be adapted.

As you can see, many companies put quite an investment in their email marketing campaigns. They are willing to spend the money because they have seen the return on their investment. Your email marketing campaign can also be monitored once you have sent out emails to customers, both current and potential. The data can be analysed in a number of ways, including web analytics, downloads, search inquiries and visits to promotional events and offline stores.

Chapter 2: Why Email Marketing?

Even though this book is on email marketing, you need to come to terms with some truths about it. For one, email marketing is not as effective as it used to be. To be more exact, email marketing started to lose the effectiveness it used to have prior to Facebook’s popularity.

As of this time of writing, more Internet users spend more time checking their Facebook and Twitter account daily. Slightly more than half of the global Internet users have a Facebook account and people aged 20 and below prefer to check their Facebook account for messages than their email! You can say the same for Twitter in spite of its 140 character limitations per direct messaging.

And get this: Gmail, one of the leading email providers, had recently implemented the ‘priority markers’ feature allowing their users to mark selected emails as important and thus change the ways people prioritize their emails for reading consumption every time they check their Inbox. And let’s be honest: promotional emails rarely ever reach PRIORITY status!

Then they a smart system that detects and filters spam emails and it gets tweaked frequently, therefore making even legit email marketing harder.

In the recent past, email marketing quickly became the preferred method of contact for businesses looking to cut expenses, connect with buyers and increase profits. However, as the dynamic world of marketing has progressed, analysts are have encountered some disadvantages to e-mail marketing that have made other alternatives like direct marketing campaigns or text campaigns look more appealing. The advantages are as below:

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Introduction

FACEBOOK has been a vital resource to businesses and marketers alike for many years now and this trend shows no sign of slowing down. Facebook is still one of the best resources out there for businesses when it comes to marketing their business and growing their brand.

Most people now expect a business to have a presence on FACEBOOK, in fact for most people its one of the first go to resources when it comes to looking into products or services (after checking out the business website) If you don't already have a FACEBOOK page for your business then I strongly recommend you fix this oversight as soon as possible otherwise you are cutting yourself off from a wonderful marketing resource that could bring you in hundreds of customers each and every month.

If you are unsure of how to set up a Facebook page for your business then there are hundreds of great websites, video courses and training guides that can take you through the process step by step. FACEBOOK has changed a lot since it was first used as an advertising tool for marketer and it is continuously changing, so you need to keep on top of these changes to make the most of it for your business.

The great news is that all the most recent changes have made Facebook an even better marketing resource for your business and marketers are seeing amazing results from FACEBOOK Ad campaigns.

Chapter 1: Building Your Business With FACEBOOK

Integrating FACEBOOK Advertising into Your Business An estimated 50 percent of active FACEBOOK users take the time to log into FACEBOOK each day. That’s some 200 million people coming to this site daily. The total amount of time people spend on FACEBOOK means there is an advertising goldmine waiting for you. Just imagine of all the new people you could expose your brand to with very minimal effort. FACEBOOK isn’t a site that people login to and log off right away.

If it’s your plan to market to global customers, FACEBOOK is the right place to turn for assistance. This site has 70 diverse translations available for just about each country on the map. In fact, an estimated 70 percent of the site’s users are living outside of the United States. This means FACEBOOK advertisers can target people living just about anywhere in the world or they can try to reach them all with a broad-based campaign.

FACEBOOK’s overall monthly usage figure makes it one of the largest players on the Internet today. If you’re ready to give up on Adwords, FACEBOOK has the exposure your advertising needs to gain attention, siphon traffic in your path and help you realize your sales goals.

Although the numbers evidently address for themselves, there are other factors that make this site eye-catching to online marketers. The social aspect of the site can work as influential force through the advertisers’ favor. Plus, the targeting potential bores down deeper than a search engine could potentially pull off.

You’ve been working hard to establish your business to as many potential target customers as possible – the ones who will discover your products appealing, and willingly spend money. You’ve done it through SEO, social networking, press releases, article marketing and perhaps even a pay-per-click campaign like Google AdWords. Basically, you’ve tried all the traditional methods that help online business catch on like a gust of

But have you thought about FACEBOOK advertising yet? If not, you may not be aware of this relatively latest source of targeted customers – the kind who you may not be able to reach by traditional way.

Just what is FACEBOOK advertising, and why should you consider it?

You’ve seen them yourself, most likely… those ads running down the right-hand side of your FACEBOOK pages and most of them about interests you mainly enjoy. You are not seeing the similar ads as everyone else accessing FACEBOOK at that moment. These ones are specially targeted to data FACEBOOK has gleaned from your preferences and other sources. FACEBOOK ads are straightforward but powerful. Each one consists of a title, text block and graphic or photo of your choice – all within an 110px X 80px “box”, to fit that vertical, right-hand FACEBOOK sidebar. If you think of them as a mix between a Twitter tweet and a banner ad, you’ve just about getting the right picture in mind!

And yes – they absolutely can be advertised:

- Product
- Services
- Contest
- Cause
- Links
- Photos
- Videos
- Business USP
- Business Event

As well as integrating:

- Your offline promotions with your online
- Real-time information for your

FACEBOOK Advertising Helps

SEO vs. Social Trends

FACEBOOK’s main advantage is its most obvious. It operates through social networking and trending rather than pure SEO – the most recent trend of this brand new decade. It allows readers to view your ads on their mobile phones – and mobile devices now outnumber personal computers, 4 to 1!

It is also cheaper than Google AdWords, and while the latter is still a brilliant method to kick-start a campaign, AdWords can be risky for new marketers, as costs per click can skyrocket faster than your

Will it substitute AdWords entirely? That shouldn’t be your aim! Plan further down the line to do what the big players do: Kick-start each campaign with well-optimized and researched AdWords.

FACEBOOK vs. Adwords Costs

But whether you utilize Adwords (SEO based) or FACEBOOK ads (social networking based), FACEBOOK ads these days are a “necessity” – mainly with the not-sodelicate switch over to mobile devices! Except it’s great for new marketers because at the moment, it’s considerably less expensive to advertise on FACEBOOK than with PPC!

Graphics Capability

Its other major benefit is that you can bring in a graphic element or photo into what is essentially just a minor text ad! Since FACEBOOK is “tuned” to graphic elements, and curiosity has been shown to hit the highest point when graphics are displayed, it wins hands-down over AdWords worn-out, annoying banner ads (traditionally low converters for over a decade).

(You could simplify it like this: Want a text ad only? – Use AdWords. Plan to use a graphic? – Use FACEBOOK Ads.)

Text Capability

You have 75 words to state what you want to say in Google AdWords (that’s less than half a tweet!) FACEBOOK ads not only allocate you a 25-character headline, but 135 words of body text, too. (That’s over double Google AdWords’ capacity – but note; spaces count.)

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Introduction

For some reason, one of the hardest things for a human to do is to eat right. Whether that is because we have limited access to resources in all areas or if it is because we simply have too much access to unhealthy food, there are many reasons that eating healthy is a challenge.

Sure, we can eat just about anything and it will sustain us. We will manage to move from one moment to the next and be able to call ourselves healthy. But is it really healthy to subsist on a diet of processed foods and sugary drinks? Just because we are alive does not mean that we are healthy. And the older we get, the more our bad habits begin to catch up with us.

It is unbelievably important to form healthy eating habits early on in life, or at least, as early as possible to prevent any future issues from occurring. You do not want to wake up one day and realize that you have had a nutrient deficiency for years and it is causing complications that are almost impossible to rectify. All of us need to take more responsibility for what we put into our bodies, because if we don’t, it can become extremely dangerous.

Of course, when we are older and we are able to look back on our mistakes, hindsight is 20/20. We realize that there were things that we could have done and probably should have done that we simply didn’t do because we were either unconscious of the ill effects, or simply lazy. Just having the simple knowledge does not necessarily make then needs to do something health-conscious a reality.

For the most part, it takes us truly being exposed to the suffering that can occur because of bad health choices before we are actually more conscious of the way we treat our bodies and our health in general. When we aren’t able to see the reality of the consequences to our actions, it can make them feel very far away and difficult to relate to. We may even blow them off entirely.

This can be a very debilitating place to find yourself in. Especially when you are already dealing from the side effects of poor eating and a lack of a healthy diet. Everybody deserves a chance to become the greatest version of themselves possible, but if we are not even acknowledging the fact that unhealthy eating can take us right off course, even in the present moment, then we are ultimately waving goodbye to the best future possible.

But all of this can change. By reading this book, you are going to understand the importance of eating healthy and how food impacts our bodies and functions. Without understanding exactly why our bodies react to food the way they do, it can sometimes be difficult to stay on track. But there are many ways that you can begin to understand why eating healthy foods is so important, and exactly how to begin on a healthy eating journey. Let’s not waste any more time. We should begin eating healthy today!

Chapter 1: Why Eat Healthy?

Healthy eating is important for a lot of reasons. Most of us are already aware of the increasing obesity epidemic in North America. This is particularly true of the United States in general. There is even a phrase for the way many Americans eat, and that is called the SAD diet. SAD stands for standard American diet, and it refers to a diet low in vegetables, high in fat and sugar, and lacking in nutrition.

Processed foods are definitely a part of the SAD diet. These are foods that are easily available and quick to consume and prepare but have long-lasting negative health effects. If you do not want to find yourself obese, it is generally considered a good idea to avoid eating such processed foods and keep your focus on eating whole grains and fruits and vegetables and meat that has not been treated with hormones and other chemicals that can ultimately end up in your body and cause issues.

Unfortunately, in North America, we are given a lot of options to slack off when it comes to preparing meals. We have so many things readily available to us, and the amount of money that you have to spend to buy bad food is far less then it is to buy good food. It seems strange that it costs more money to buy organic than it does to buy foods that will ultimately cause health problems in the long run, but that is the rule of supply and demand.

Not only that, but processed foods are mass-produced and make a huge profit because of their convenience.

That is why, in many ways, and obesity epidemic in North America is not particularly surprising. Nutrition is not number one on the list of companies that are attempting to cash in on people’s laziness in the kitchen.

However, there are many ways that eating healthy is important, and good reasons to avoid processed foods and the standard American diet. For example, if you do not want to be obese, you should definitely look into the rest of this book for ways to improve your diet and begin a healthier lifestyle.

Another reason to eat healthy is because you can make yourself prone to diseases by eating unhealthy foods and by staying on a standard American diet that is full of fat and sugar. Diabetes is something that can be developed because of poor eating and can often times be treated with healthy eating. Type II diabetes is ultimately something that can be maintained and controlled with proper eating habits and triggered by poor eating habits. If you want to avoid these types of difficulties and complications, you should do your best to be conscientious about your food choices.

Other diseases can result from poor eating as well. High blood pressure is common, as well as other chronic diseases. Osteoporosis is something that can affect many people later in life because they were not making healthy eating choices earlier on. You may find yourself suffering from poor bone health, hypertension, or even heart problems. All of which can be very demanding on your body and cause major stress that can ultimately be very dangerous.

If you want to show your family that you care about them, you should begin making choices now that will help you to stay in their lives for as long as possible. Poor health is not something that only affects you. It is also something that affects the people around you. If they are watching you suffer because of poor choices that you have made, in a way, that is quite selfish. They are suffering too. Now, do your best to make the choices that will be the best not only for yourself, but for your family in the long run. This book will show you how.

Chapter 2: Understanding Your Relationship with Food Over the course of time, everybody begins to develop certain habits. We develop habits in all arenas of our lives.

We develop hygiene habits, food habits, work habits, and all sorts of other types of habits. However, they are usually pretty oblivious to our habits until they begin to affect us negatively. And even then, when we begin to understand that we are being poorly impacted by our habits, it can be very difficult to change them.

Because that is what I have it is like. A habit is something that we do almost unconsciously. We are programmed to follow these habits, and it takes a great amount of willpower to break free from the cycle.

Once you begin to understand that your relationship with food has everything to do with the habits that you have created and habits that you can continue to mold and cultivate, then it becomes far easier to change your mindset. When you realize the impact and importance of your future and making positive choices about these things, it can make you more primed toward healthy eating and less inclined to make choices that negatively impact you and your future.

To be truthful, many of us seem to consider the future bleak. We do not see reasons enough to change our habits because if we do not believe that we have anything good to look forward to, then it doesn’t matter whether we make good choices or not. We do not see how we can actually pave our future to be in our best interests. Probably because we do not believe that we have any power over our lives.

If you can relate to this feeling, don’t be alarmed. It is very common of the human experience. We are generally discouraged from taking control and utilizing our power from an early age, and sometimes stopped believing we have any authority over our lives because we are usually told what to do by other people.

As children, that makes sense. Children don’t always know what is best for them. But it can encourage a very helpless type of mindset that causes us to have a hard time understanding that the consequences of our actions can truly begin to shape who we are and how we present ourselves to the world.

This is why it is important to truly take steps to help you understand yourself and your dietary habits. When did your habit begin? How did you form that habit? Why? What benefits do you have from this habit? What negative effects do you have from this habit? Ask yourself as many of these questions as you possibly can so that you begin to truly have an understanding of how it is that you are shaping your future with the food that you are eating. Are you creating a healthy and energized future, or are you creating a future that is bleak and potentially full of negative health consequences? Next, evaluate your sense of self discipline. Are you capable of maintaining discipline over your choices? Or is this an area where you struggle? Discipline can be difficult for everybody, and if you find yourself having a hard time staying disciplined, it would do you well to look into different ways that you are able to encourage yourself to be a more disciplined person both in practice and mentally. Only then will you truly have what it takes to begin a journey of healthy eating.

Because whether we like it or not, and bad health choices are everywhere. They are easy and they are addicting. If we allow ourselves to be swayed by these poor choices, and do nothing to change our habits, then it doesn’t matter whether you eat healthy sometimes or not. The negative effects will still be gripping your body and waiting to spring up on you when you least expect it.

In a way, unhealthy eating is a selfdestructive pattern that a lot of us take part in. Whether this is because of poor self-esteem, or simply because we are unhappy with our situations and have no faith in the future, self-destructive eating patterns are dangerous. You have to look to yourself and truly value your life and your future before eating healthy will stick.

There are many ways that you can do this, and if possible, you may even want to consult a mental health professional for support. Sometimes, they can help us to see biases and negative patterns in our lives that we remain oblivious to. Once those are understood and accepted, then it can be that much easier to overcome them and take the steps that you need to take in order to make positive choices.

Whether you seek out the help of a qualified professional or not, there are many things that you can do to change your mindset. As long as you understand that you are worthy of a healthy body and a positive future, then you will allow yourself to take the steps necessary to get there. But if you do not feel good about yourself, it is going to be a lot harder.

Overall, understanding yourself, your habits, your mental roadblocks, and your discipline, will help you in your journey. All of us can take steps every day toward becoming our best possible selves, and healthy eating is one great step in that direction. And it is a step we can take today!

Chapter 3: The Dangers of Diet Trends

Diet trends are rampant in our society today, and almost all of them come with dangers attached to them. Unfortunately, most people who are desperate to make money often don’t look at the long-term health consequences of their products. What they are truly concerned about is making money and doing something that will help them to capitalize off of a desperate desire that many people have to lose weight in a fast and easy way.

There is something that you are going to have to accept if diet trends are something that captivate your interest. The unfortunate fact of the matter is that there is no healthy way to lose weight fast and easily with no work and no healthy eating and no exercise. Losing weight is a good goal if you are obese or if you are lacking in fitness and you need extra mobility. All of us have at times needed to start making better lifestyle choices, and that is something that we can do with food and healthy body movement as opposed to by trusting companies that want to exploit us in order to make money.

Some of the diet trends out there are exceptionally dangerous and have dire health consequences both long-term and short-term. Many of them rely on methods that cause us to starve ourselves and Robert body of essential nutrients. Sometimes, even dehydrating us. These types of diet trends are extremely disgusting. They are taking advantage of people who want to be healthy but don’t know how to go about it. They are taking advantage of people, often women in particular, who are crumbling under the pressures of unrealistic beauty standards and women who are told that to have any value, they must look a certain way.

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Introduction

Ten million people in America practice mindful meditation. That’s quite a lot. Mindful meditation has become popular as more and more people enjoy living a better, less stressful, more productive life.

Why are these people turning to meditation to improve their daily lives? The easy answer is, meditation works. The more complex answer is that today, we are suffering from information overload and stress more than previous generations. Some meditators want to reduce stress and enjoy greater peace. Others seek more awareness to create a more purposeful life. Still others want to gain greater awareness and align their thoughts with their actions.

Mindful meditation is useful for all of these purposes. What is true for everyone, however, is that the more you know about your thinking, the more you are in control of your life.

Whatever the reason, mindful meditation can be a powerful force. Like music, life has many layers, and mindful meditation can help you become aware of all the nuances.

Mindful meditation isn’t magic. It allows you to concentrate your awareness on the here and now. All too frequently, our attention can scatter into the past or the future. We become distracted and unable to focus on what is important in the present.

Mindful meditation gives us power to focus on the here and now.

It increases our mental energy, allowing us to perform better and achieve more. Quite simply, mindful meditation makes us more efficient in many areas of our lives.

More importantly, it puts us in control. The mind is an extremely complex labyrinth, where the subconscious can rule and throw roadblocks in our path. There are times we behave in certain ways without being consciously aware of why. Mindful meditation increases our awareness and opens our minds to more answers.

Our senses are heightened as we enjoy the present more fully.

Everyday activities, from what we eat, how we enjoy art and listen to music, and how we respond to friends and family become more vivid as mental walls crumble.

Mindful meditation relaxes us. With awareness, stress and unpleasant thoughts become less threatening and easier to handle.

We become more relaxed and are able to let more joy and peace into our lives.

Today, we live in a state of impermanence more than ever before in history. More than a hundred years ago, most people spent their lives in the town in which they were born. They knew all their neighbors. Their station in life determined their job. It may not sound ideal to us, but it certainly wasn’t stressful. These days, we live very fragmented lives. We may move regularly and barely know our neighbors. We switch jobs and friends on a regular basis.

Constant change has become the one permanence on which we can rely. There’s no denying that modern knowledge and conveniences have brought us untold advantages. However, at the same time, we have lost our connection to others and our surroundings. Mindful meditation brings back that important lost connection to what is happening inside of us and around us. It’s not an antidote to the problems of living in the 21st century, but it can provide the skills to help us cope with many of its problems.

You don’t have to be a yogi to reap the benefits of mindful meditation. The more you practice, the better you will become. It’s like exercise for the mind. You know what daily exercise does for your body. It strengthens and firms those muscles.

In much the same way, daily mindful meditation strengthens your mind and hones your thinking process. It’s both simple and complex, and at all times, it’s a choice. Hopefully, this book will help you make the right one for you. Consistency is the key to successful practice. Even a short meditation period every day is more effective than sporadic longer meditations.

Like physical exercise, mindful meditation is a process. Success doesn’t happen overnight. But it will happen. When you begin your meditation journey, you may find it difficult to sit quietly for 15 or 20 minutes at a time. You may start making excuses why it’s okay to skip meditation for just one day.

This will make it harder to resume meditating the following day, and you’ll easily find an excuse why you shouldn’t. You’re too tired, too busy, too frustrated … any excuse will do. That’s why making a commitment to regular meditation is necessary. Ask yourself what motivated you in the first place. Make a pact with yourself that you will get up half an hour earlier in the morning to meditate. With a firm commitment, you will gain momentum and see the results.

Mindful meditation is unrivalled in its ability to open your mind.

If you are new at mindful meditation, it is helpful that you ask yourself what has motivated you to start meditating at this time.

There is, however, no right or wrong reason.

Chapter 1

What Is Mindful Meditation?

Mindful meditation is actually very simple, yet it comes with great benefits.

The Origin Of Mindful Meditation

It’s a Western practice with roots in thousands of years of Buddhism, where it’s referred to as “Insight Meditation.” As that name suggests, it is meant to develop our mental skills and become more aware. However, mindful meditation is not associated with any specific ideology.

Mindfulness is a skill we all possess, but not all of us develop and cultivate it fully. The unique thing about mindful meditation is that it allows us to take an active part in our thinking process instead of remaining passive. It’s more than being aware of the world around us; it specifically refers to that exciting and sometimes mysterious world inside of us. Mindfulness increases our awareness of ourselves and how we think. It’s an effective way of knowing ourselves better.

Mindful meditation is always purposeful and non-judgmental. We calmly accept and acknowledge what is. Instead of moving through the day on autopilot, mindful meditation allows us to be more present and gain more control over our thoughts and activities. This invariable enriches our lives beyond measure.

Mindfulness To Tackle Daily Challenges

When we practice mindful meditation consistently, we gain an inner calm that will help us deal with life’s many challenges. How often have we become so stressed that we have consciously avoided

thinking about our problems, which then only worsen as we become more stressed? Sometime, it may feel easier not to think at all. But in the long run, reality will take over.

Non-judgmental awareness allows us to remove ourselves mentally from the mental tsunami and remain calm in times of adversity. We become more connected to our experiences in a healthy, non-threatening way.

On a basic human level, it’s natural for us to push aside unpleasant thoughts by distracting ourselves from what is really important. Addictions to alcohol, drugs and social media are just some of the ways we avoid dealing with the present.

This obviously is not helpful and merely generates greater anxiety and stress. Daily mindful meditation keeps us focused on the present and helps us deal with problems rather than avoiding them. Fortunately, becoming more aware is a skill that can be learned. Like playing a musical instrument or a sport, the more we practice, the better we become at it.