It's only 15 weeks to Christmas apparently! I had someone at work today leave me a mince pie on my desk and a note to say just 105 days to go! It really made me smile and, of course, made me think of Christmas and the nice times you can have with your family and friends at that time of year.

Now it may be 105 days away but if you think 'Christmas' then you immediately get the 'nice' feelings associated, and the memories will come into your head.

Therefore always remember that what you are thinking of at any moment in time controls the feelings you have at that exact moment in time. So if you pretend to be happy all weekend then you won't be able to stop feeling happy for real all weekend, give it a try :-)

This week's article is called 'Need To Be Needed' and was definitely me when I was big and is also very common in people I see. It is when you aren't 100% sure you actually like yourself and hence you need others to like you and tell you how great you are because you aren't so sure yourself.

Before I leave this week I want to just talk about fitting in. I went to a conference on Tuesday where I had to talk to around 1000 people. I was the only person in the room who wasn't wearing a suit. I was wearing just a shirt and tie as it was a warm day and I didn't want to wear a suit.

Anyway, after I spoke and went to walk out I had a guy come up to me and say that I looked strange because I had no suit on, and that I didn't look very professional. It didn't irritate me as it would once have done but I did say to him that I used to care what everyone else thought about me and so I conducted myself according to everyone else's opinions. The day I stopped caring about whether I 'fitted in' was a good day in my life, it was around the same time I started to live my life by own rules and became happy, it was also the time I stopped needing to be needed.

Have an amazing week as always!!

Mike ;-)