David Stidston
Bio
My name is David Stidston, and I am a single father to my 8-year-old daughter Mia. We live in the beautiful city of Hobart in Tasmania, Australia. I am currently self-employed, working as a freelancer and casually in market research.
Stories (216)
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20 Quotes To Inspire Us To Make Every Moment Count
When we were young, it felt like the days would last forever, and we had all the time in the world. As we have begun to age though, all of a sudden we have started wondering where the time has gone, and we are amazed at how quickly the days continue to pass us by. The most precious gift we have been given in life, after life itself, is time. Time is a double edged sword however. Time is a blessing, as it allows us to create memories, to laugh, to enjoy life, to relish in happiness, to generate success, and to cherish moments with our family and friends, but it can also be our greatest enemy, because if we don't use it effectively, efficiently, and beneficially, it leaves us with huge regret and sadness. Time is one of the most precious gifts we are given in life because it provides us with opportunity, a chance to spend the time we have being filled with love, happiness, positivity, joy, and gratitude. Time is a surprise gift though, yet it's only a temporary one, because we don't know exactly how much of it we actually have. We are basically handed a time bomb to which we know is guaranteed to blow up at some stage, but that element of surprise is not a good thing, as we have no idea when it will explode, and our life will come to a conclusion. We have that time bomb attached to us from the day we are born, and although at such an early age, we have no concept about time and it's preciousness, that time bomb is set to explode on a certain date, and it's a date that we never have any insight to throughout our entire life. Some people are blessed with numerous days, and live well into their elderly years, whilst others aren't so blessed, and sadly lose their life at an early age.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
20 Inspiring Quotes About Sacrifice
April the 25th is a day of significant importance, reflection, and remembrance for both Australia and New Zealand, as it was on this day back in 1915 in which the Australian and New Zealand armed forces landed at dawn on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey, where they would first engage in World War 1. It was a campaign devised to capture Constantinople and the Ottoman Empire, and eliminate them from further engagement in the war, as they were a close ally of Germany, however it would end up being a costly move, as the Australian and New Zealand troops, who formed the Allied expedition, would make up over 11,000 of the 56,000 lives lost in that battle. It is why the two countries have since reserved April the 25th on the annual calendar as a public holiday, and a day to remember and honor those who were prepared to sacrifice their lives in order to protect the lives of their countrymen, and all innocent civilians. Not only has Anzac Day become a day to honor and remember our fellow countrymen and women who did serve in World War 1, but also all those who have served in any wars and conflicts since. Talk about bravery and courage, these everyday average citizens of the two countries were called upon to defend our borders, to protect us and other innocent countries from the destruction and terrorism that the likes of Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire, were trying to inflict on the world. It would be an incredibly difficult assignment to take on, be it voluntarily or involuntarily, because they were heading offshore to place their own life at risk, in a bid to save others, hence we use today as our way of honoring and remembering all those who did place their life at risk, and all those who did lose their life.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
Freedom Is A Choice!
Having freedom in life can be considered a bit of a grey area, as after all, we have certain rules, laws, and regulations, imposed by the respective government of the country that we live in, that we must abide by. So to suggest we have absolute freedom, and we can do what we want, may not totally be 100% accurate. The rules, laws, and regulations imposed though are normally introduced for the greater protection and best interest of society overall. Any act that places oneself or other people's lives at risk or in danger, or violates a person in any way, such as speeding, murder, theft, pedophilia, etc., well they are always going to have laws imposed against them, obviously. There are many laws, rules, and regulations imposed that are perhaps against people's beliefs or religion, and we see opposition to these through the regular protests that take place, but in all fairness, and dependent to which country we reside in, most of us have the freedom to create and live a life by our own design. Unless we break the law, there's nothing stopping us from making decisions that are in our best interest to create a life blessed with happiness, success, and prosperity. Freedom consists of several definitions. Freedom is having "the power or right to act, speak, or think, as one wants". Freedom is having "the power of self-determination attributed to the will; the quality of being independent of fate or necessity". Freedom is being in "a state of not being imprisoned or enslaved". Freedom is being in "a state of being unrestricted, and being able to move easily". Freedom is "having unrestricted use of something". Freedom is being in "the state of not being subject to, or affected by, something undesirable". So what does freedom look like to us though?
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
Happiness Is A Choice
I don't think there would be one person in the world who would say they would love to live their life in unhappiness. Each and every one of us want to experience joy, satisfaction, enjoyment, and fulfillment, but not just in spurts, we want to feel that happiness on an ongoing basis, in all aspects of life. We also have to be realistic and understand that life will continually heave challenges and adversities upon us, but once we discover true happiness in our life, we have that positive mindset and attitude to, not just accept such times will happen, but also to openly embrace them and be proactive in overcoming them. The big questions are, how do we discover this happiness, and does such happiness even exist? Well the answer to the second question is yes, it does exist. The secret to happiness rests within our mind. No matter how many, or what, suggestions and recommendations myself, or other motivational speakers, life coaches, positive minded, or already genuinely happy individuals, offer you, no one can bring you happiness. Happiness is generated from our own individual thoughts, perceptions, beliefs, and choices, which of course all start from the mind. Happiness is a choice! With all the negativity in the world, which contributes to why so many negative minded and pessimistic people surround us, combined with all the adversities and stresses that we have to deal with in life, our mindset and attitude will constantly be tested. There is no reprieve basically. Therefore, it leaves us with a choice of two options. The first is to allow that negativity, adversity, and stress to consume us, and draw us into constantly feeling unhappy, miserable, negative minded, and pessimistic, which will never get us anywhere in life, let alone bring us happiness. The second option is to remain positive minded, to focus on the positive aspects of our life, to remain goals driven, to be optimistic, to continually believe in ourselves, to be proactive in overcoming all adversities we encounter, and to actually concentrate on finding happiness within life. We can't be happy if we choose not to be happy, it's that simple! Happiness indeed starts within the mind, but today I am going to enlighten you on five different ways to encourage happiness into your life, so you can live a life of satisfaction and fulfillment.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
From Adversity To Heroism
Growing up in the 1970's-1980's, one of the most recognized and popular films to hit the screens was the Superman series, which consisted of three sequels, with a fourth that was later released in 2006, with a different cast. The first four movies of the series were simply titled Superman (1978), Superman 2 (1980), Superman 3 (1983), and Superman 4- The Quest For Peace (1987), and in each of these films, Superman himself was played by no other than American actor, the late Christopher Reeve. Superman, of course, is a fictional superhero who first shot to fame via Action Comics #1, in which writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster teamed up to create a character that so many children, and even many adults, so wanted to be. With super powers such as superhuman strength, x-ray vision, heat vision, cold breath, super speed, enhanced hearing, the ability to fly, and much more, Superman became a child idol. Christopher Reeve played the part to perfection in the films, and basically became the face of Superman. At the age of 24, Reeve was tall, but slender, and in order to fit the role of a character that was pictured as being strong and muscular, he had to undertake a demanding 2 month training regimen, consisting of running, weightlifting, and trampolining, which saw him add on 14kgs to his muscle weight. Like any other human being on the planet, the Superman that we saw in the films was not exempt to adversity and challenge in real life, as being Christopher Reeve himself. As a teenager he suffered from loss of hair in patches, courtesy of a disease called alopecia areata, he was an asthmatic, he had several severe reactions to various drugs and antibiotics, including one in which made his heart stop, he received treatment for an infected pressure ulcer, and he would have several serious infections that originated from his bone marrow, many in which were life threatening. Reeve's biggest adversity of his life came in 1995 though. When out participating in a horse riding event, as horse riding and equestrian was one of his biggest passions in life, the horse he was riding came to a sudden halt prior to jumping a fence, propelling Reeve forward. He became tangled in the reins, before landing head first over the fence, which resulted in his first and second vertebrae becoming shattered. The injury paralyzed him from the neck down, as his breathing was also halted until paramedics arrived. The man recognized as Superman, had sadly become someone who lost the ability to ever walk again.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
From Being Fearful To Fearless
Okay, I admit it, I have arachnophobia. I can't stand spiders, well at least huntsmen anyway. They fill me up with a great deal amount of fear, and I very quickly distance myself from them as soon as possible. I'm always paranoid that one will be inside the car one day, and when I pull down the sun visor, all of a sudden this horrible eight legged cretan will fall into my lap, and pretty much give me a heart attack. I don't know how I would react, and I don't even want to think of it, to be honest. I don't know what it is about them, be it their size, or the fact they just randomly drop from the ceiling, or be it the size of their pincers, but I cannot stand them. I don't care how much people say that huntsmen are harmless, and I'm just overreacting, I ain't getting near them, thanks very much. That's definitely one thing I love about this house I am living in, I haven't seen a huntsman in the 10 years I have been here, touch wood. Fear is a common human emotion after all. We all have different fears in life, be it claustrophobia (fear of confined spaces), ophidiophobia (fear of snakes), acrophobia (fear of heights), trypanophobia (fear of needles), or whatever it may be. It's common to be scared of something. Have you ever heard of these three phobias before though; periculophobia, metathesiophobia, and atychiphobia? Personally I haven't, so I had to research them, but in order of what they are, they would be a fear of taking risks, a fear of change, and a fear of failure. These three phobias aren't in the same category as my arachnophobia is, and the reason being is that my fear doesn't prevent me from achieving a future blessed with happiness, success, prosperity, and fulfillment, whereby these three actually do. It's these three phobias that are so common amongst society, yet people aren't even aware of them, because unlike spiders in which you can visually see, the fear of risk, change and failure, are all only visible in the mind.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
The Doing Must Come With The Desire
Growing up, I always considered the word "desire" to be a very sexually provocative type of word. Don't ask me why, that's just always how I perceived it. It's like I created my own definition to the word, believing it to be an uncontrollable yearning for lust, or having an unbridled passion for intimacy. To be fair on me, I wasn't totally wrong, however desire relates to more than just lust and intimacy. Desire is simply defined as "having a strong feeling of wanting to have something, or wishing for something to happen". Let's face it, many people do indeed have a strong desire for sexual relations and intimacy, so it doesn't really make my definition incorrect, perhaps just a little limited. Desire has become one of the most commonly used words in my blog entries nowadays, and that's because it relates to pretty much everyone. We wouldn't be human if there wasn't something that we desperately wanted to have in life, or something that we were wishing for. It therefore makes desire a very common emotion. There's a couple of crucial words in the definition of desire that I want to highlight though, them being wishing and wanting. As much as desire is a very common and powerful emotion, it still lacks substance. I'd compare it to how I always talk about the difference between motivation and drive. If you don't know what I'm talking about there, motivation and drive are both key emotional behaviors to possess when it comes to achieving goals. Motivation is of course the enthusiasm and willingness to do something, however it is an emotional behavior that does tend to fluctuate, depending on mood, mindset, and outside influences. It lacks that steadfast nature that prevents people from giving up, because it is so easily influenced. Drive, on the other hand, is when you cause something abstract to actually happen and eventuate. It's a solid emotional behavior, because you are fixated and determined to create a certain result, without any negative impact from mood, outside influence, or even failures. Desire is like motivation, being that it's an emotional behavior that is inspiring and encouraging, yet it isn't equipped with a supporting mechanism to turn that wish or want into achievement.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
The Gift Of Awareness
I will openly admit to what is one of my biggest flaws in my life currently, and has unfortunately been for several years also. When antagonized or unfairly criticized by someone, I tend to react very abruptly, and am quick to respond in anger. No one likes to be antagonized or criticized after all, yet I know that in responding with a fiery temper, and reacting with a heap of criticism and verbal abuse in return, I'm only dragging myself down to their level. Sadly, I've been lacking that emotional control needed to resist reacting in such a manner, and one of the very reasons why I have engaged myself in mindset training and strengthening these past couple of years, so I can better resist reacting with such fury. As I said, I know it is a massive flaw of mine, one that I am certainly not proud of, and one that I am desperate to remove from my behaviors. I was never that sort of person in my youth or my early adulthood. I was actually the total opposite. It seems that the turning point to my behavior and attitude came about when I first entered into depression, back in 2010. My depression undoubtedly came from the lack of happiness, satisfaction, and fulfillment in my life, caused mainly by my career, but also from associating with people who were in no way beneficial to my mental health. Not only that, I think I grew tired of constantly being the nice guy, whilst allowing everyone just to walk all over me in life. As much as I credit myself for standing up to people now, and defending myself better, the manner in which I respond and react needs to be at a far more mature level than it is.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
Career Choice
A common belief that has been created by society is that work is simply not meant to be enjoyed, and that it is nothing more than a legal means of generating money, in order to survive. Think about how many times you hear your friends complain about how much they hate their job, or the number of times your workmates whinge about how much the manager, the working conditions, the customers, and the company sucks. Perhaps you only need to go as far as your own words and opinions about your job, and realize how much you also dislike it, and how much you actually whinge and complain about it yourself? Well, if it is in any way comforting, you're certainly in the overwhelming majority of people globally, who also hate their job. Studies have revealed that nearly 9 out of every 10 people dislike or hate their job. That's a pretty damning statistic, made even worse by the fact that for nearly a third of our life, between the age of 18 and 65, we find ourselves at our job, or running our business. When you consider that another third of that time is spent sleeping, that leaves us with just one third of our life, over those 45 years, to be potentially doing activities we actually enjoy. Even within that final third, there are still the basic tasks that consume our time, such as cooking, eating, showering, and cleaning, further reducing any time that we can be doing the things in life we really enjoy, such as traveling, spending time with our family, socializing with our friends, and engaging in our hobbies. Now let's be honest, in those 45 years though, despite those brief periods of doing the things we love, work is always there enveloping in this bubble of unhappiness, because it is such a dominant aspect of our life. We may love and value our sleep, we may enjoy and relish in the time outside of work, but there still lies that 33% of time that we are unhappy, and that's well and truly enough to drag our whole attitude down.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
Leadership Over Followers
It was pretty much straight after Christmas last year in which I made a choice that I was no longer going to use my personal social media profiles just to post pictures of my life, and advertise them to the world. As wonderful as it is to capture certain memorable moments, and post them online for friends and family to see, in all honesty, it's not exactly an activity of huge benefit really. Photographs have always served as a perfect means of capturing a memory, or the perfect scenery, there's no disputing that, and posting them on social media should preserve those images online forever, unlike with physical photographs, which can easily be destroyed by fire. I've become more of a person who prefers to live in the moment, opting to relish in the preciousness of the experience at the time, rather than be sidetracked by fiddling around with a phone or camera trying to take a happy snap. Each to their own though. I will still continue to post personal photos from time to time, but the reason behind the decision I made to start using my personal social media profiles in a different manner was because I wanted to begin sharing more positivity, inspiration, and motivation. I was dedicating time to posting motivational content on my business website and social media pages, yet I was actually not sharing it directly with my own friends and family via my own personal profile. All the personal development content and education I have been investing my time in, along with all that I have personally experienced throughout the journey towards achieving my goal, I was leaving out the very people who I should have been prioritizing, and looking to positively influence and help educate.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
Prove Them Wrong
Undoubtedly, one of the worst things about the journey towards achieving our goals, is the lack of support, the opposition, the doubt, and the criticism, we receive from others. What makes that even worse again is the fact that many of these people are very close to our heart, and dear to us, such as our parents, our partner, our family, and our friends, the very exact people we believed would always be there for us. When we first start to encounter this lack of support, opposition, doubt, criticism, from them, it can be a real shock to the system. In all honesty, it's quite hurtful and upsetting. These are the very people that regularly tell us they love us, they care for us, and they want the best for us in life, and yet when it comes to the time where we take the plunge, and we have the courage to begin pursuing our goals and a future we desire for ourselves, they try and talk us out of it, or they oppose it. It doesn't make sense! They say they love and care for us, and they want the best for us, and yet they stop us from striving for the very thing that we believe in our heart will provide us happiness and success for the future. Why would someone that loves us want to stop us from achieving success and happiness? That's not love! It begs the question, why? Why do they oppose us, criticize us, doubt us, and withdraw their support for us? There are generally four reason behind why, them being agenda, inconvenience, superiority, and embarrassment. Let me elaborate on these. Firstly, agenda. When I say agenda, I mean that us pursuing our goal doesn't fit their agenda. What we are trying to accomplish is not what they envisioned or planned for us, and it's not what they want us to do. It's funny that we have each been blessed with our own life to live, yet for some reason, people like to believe they can manipulate us to live our life to their design also, and not our own. People will often try and manipulate us to follow their advice and recommendations, purely for their own personal gain, in some way, shape, or form.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
How Far Are You Prepared To Go?
Determination is all about making a firm decision to achieve a certain desired result, and then having the steely resolve to follow through with that decision. It's a commitment and pact to oneself, that no matter what circumstances, challenges, opposition, and adversities, we face in pursuing that result, we will honor that decision. There's no out, there's no escape route, and there's no option to give up or quit. It's a simple case of agreeing to just one result only, and that is succeeding in accomplishing that desired result. Setting a goal for ourselves is the easiest part of the journey to success. Having said that, it's astounding that so many people even have difficulty doing this. We sort of have an idea of what we desire, but there's no real context or solidity to it. A lot of people simply wish for wealth, longing to be rich so they can have more freedom to buy what they like, and do more of what they like. That's not a goal however! They set this plan to quit work, and then go about living the high life, but such a plan serves no purpose. So many people who have inherited wealth, or perhaps have struck it lucky on the lottery, have thought all their wishes had come true, yet within a few years of having gained this wealth, they find themselves back in the same position they were beforehand. They end up burning through the funds because they were too focused on treating themselves to a life of luxury, that they lose sight of the importance of investing and budgeting. Money may enhance our life in various ways, but it doesn't assure happiness, like many people seem to think it would. It's why money should never be at the centre of our goals.
By David Stidston5 years ago in Motivation
