http://www.johnfishbein.com/princ2.htm 
Positive thinking, useful thinking, effective thinking, creative thinking, clear thinking

He goes into good detail and steps.
Like this part":

Set a thinking goal you can immediately begin to succeed in accomplishing.

Incorrect: I will always keep my thoughts within the guidelines I have set.

Reason: A promise to always or never think certain thoughts is difficult if not impossible to keep; hence, you are apt to make yourself miserable and eventually give up

.

Correct: I will learn to keep my thoughts within the guidelines I set.

Key Point: "I will learn" is a goal you can begin to succeed with immediately and continue for the rest of your life.

My only regret is not living in the present moment.

I used to believe in determinism, then I was determined to believe otherwise.

I once heard a quote that went something like "Weeds. Plants whos purpose have not yet been defined."

Well, a friend of mine taught me that dandelion plants (a popular weed) is edible. It actually tastes really good.

And I found a story about dandelions in Anthony De Mello's 'The Song of The Bird':

A man who took great pride in his lawn found himself with a large crop of dandelions.
He tried every method he knew to get rid of them. Still they plagued him.

Finally he wrote the Department of Agriculture.
He enumerated all the things he had tried and closed his letter with the question:
"What shall I do now?"

In due course the reply came: "We suggest you learn to love them."

"My lawn, of course, was ruined. But how attractive my garden became!"

I like these, and similar seem them to me.

A seeker went to the master and asked:
"How shall I get liberation?"
"Find out who has bound you," said the Master.
The disciple returned after a week and said,
"No one has bound me."
The master replied, "Then why ask to be liberated?"

That was a moment of Enlightenment for the disciple,
who suddenly realized his freedom.

From Anthony De Mello (look him up on youtube for some excellent humorous "spiritual" talk givings)

And then, there is this one from Robert Rabbin:

A man went to visit an enlightened sage.
He asked, "Master I am very busy and i don’t have time for spiritual practices
or to study the scriptures, is there any way you can summarize what all the great saints, what all the religions and what all the scriptures have to say about the highest truth.
The master replied, "Yes of course I’ll be happy to. In fact I can put the highest truth into one simple word."
"Oh that is wonderful," said the man, "What is that word."
"Silence." said the master
"But how do you find this Silence." asked the man.
"Meditation." answered the master.
"Well, what is meditation?" asked the man.
and the master said
"Silence."

The universe is as it is.
Its laws are as they are.
Energy animates form.
All we can do is be what we are, which we have always been, the deeper reality witnessing the play of life.
Surrender is understanding that.
You have never done anything, as there is no past, and you only exist now.
You will never do anything, as there is no future, and you only are now.

You are a victim only in time, but never right now.

You do not grow your hair, pump your heart, or create hunger, thirst, and the other needs that drive your nature. You did not choose your name, or choose your conditioning.

What is an action, anyway? What is a decision, anyway? There is 24 hour activity. You don't "decide" with each step and each breath you take. It all flows as one seamless natural activity. That is, when the mind isn't interfering & making experience into segmented blocks.

The conditioned mind, of course, creates the fiction & friction of a mini-me inside of the skull.
Surrender is to see through the illusory sense of control, which creates the sense of limitation & fear, to the deeper intuitive guide within. It is to surrender the illusion of time to the now. To fall from the head to the heart.

You are free right now. All suffering comes from abiding by the rules we have been taught on how to play the game of life. From accepting a name and a reputation. From accepting slavery and limitation. From choosing to be phony to pealse other people. From playing the game of "impress others."

Love and accept yourself for no reason, like you did as a child. Feel the spontaneous wonder of just being, exploring, creating. Remember that mysteriousness. The undefinability of the miracle of existence, this life. That gap in childhood memory, before all the seriousness and boring adult games began. Before the world became solid and a burden on your senses.

The worst conditioning is likely that we have to earn happiness. That its some sort of glitery prize to steal through cleverness and power. Or that there is some precious being to become or prove that we are. Happiness is simple. Happiness is our nature. Happiness is what we are, unseeking of anything else.

There is a universal will, which guides all of life synchronistically. The more you allow yourself to harmonize with the universal will, the more your life will be harmonious, flowing, and synched.

So let be.
Dance with life.
Enjoy the infinite journey.
Play!

The more patient, grateful, and content you are with what is, the more patient, grateful, and content you will be with what is. The more joy you have, the more peace you will have. The more love you have, the more kindness you will feel.

The more sensitive, gentle, and unobstructive you are, the more you will hear, the more you will notice. The more your intuition will speak to you and through you. Be like an alien, a visitor or travelor, in a strange and wondrous world, here only for a brief moment.

How would you live if you knew that you had only 50 years left to live? Not to mention most of those years are going to be lived unyoung. How many attachments & cravings are due just to this one simple illusion: Permanence. Not even just permanence, but the sense of "a long time". Its not long if you think about it. Its infinitismally small.

The opposite, In my opinion, is even better. (Both are good really, in different ways)
How would you feel if you had infinite time on your hands. That relaxing natural feeling of total patience is a great peace that makes living much more pleasent. And its extremely easy to create.

Its difficult to be natural, to go with the flow, but only to our blocky minds, that understand only strategies.
No strategies work. But its a thrill to face the fear of acting outside of conditioning. To not be stupid, and to laugh at yourself for having followed along with the herd.

Effort is good too, but I think it should be inspired. If its just burdensom duty, then its just more negative resistence. The earnestness of flaming intention matters more than the complexity of strategy.

Life was never meant to be complicated!

Effort can still be natural. Effort is not work. Effort, to me, is like playing a challenging video game. It is a fun adventure, rather than a guilty burden.

Basically we have a passive and active side, a yin and a yang. Effort is yang. Receptivity and "let" is yin. Both in harmony is productive flow.

Trust your own common sense and intuition. Rely on the unfolding wisdom on your heart, rather than on the outer mind and all its deathly appearances.

See the residual shadows of the puppet past for as they seem.
Know the future for what it is not, real.

Rest in the strenth of definite intention.

How to rule the universe:
1. Find out the universal weakness of all.
2. Find out the univerasal strength of all.
3. Poke at the weakness and distract the strength.

How to unrule the universe:
1. Find out the laws of power
2. Find out the laws of unpower
3. Use the unpower laws against the power laws.

How to have fun in the universe
1. Find out the universal amusement.
2. Find out the universal boredom.
3. Use the universal amusement to amuse the universal boredom.

How to protect the universe:
1. Find out what is going right in the universe
2. Find out what is going wrong in the universe.
3. Keep what is going right in the universe from what is going wrong.

How to enrage the universe.
1. Find out what beings are attached to in the unviverse.
2. Find out what beings are not attached to in the universe.
3. Draw attention to the attachments, and distract from the not attached.

I have too much I need stuff.

Not enough this is enough.

This moment is now.
When time falls asleep, and numbers arise in random sequence.

With hair in your air, and waves on your spashes.

I can give everything to my love, to my growing change.
I can accept forgiveness, from uncertain mistakes.

I can surrender make-sense for make-believe. Trust in the laughter of divinity.

In the humor of chaos, chance, and change.

I can make art into smart. And start when I depart.

Exit existence, and enter entertainment.

Get out of this trance, and dance I dare!

I can go God!

I can let everything I wish dance in and out of me.

Like a spiral of communion, liver-pooling me.

This is your welcoming dance, my friendly universe. And I wave goodbye and say hello, to everything I encounter accidancely.

Infinite fun is tha law of numbers, which play with disciplined disciples bowing before the bowling God.

I pretend to play, but I am serious in love with you.
I don't need you, but I can jump into you!

Play with this reality!

Let your desk be smart and strong, and your hands be smooth and loose. 

Falsehood is truly false, but falsely true.
This is the ultimate truth of falsehood.
Keep it forever out of mind, and and eternally into heart.

May your truth bless you with the wisdom of absolute bliss.

2008 was a long long year. 365 days of pure year. A whole revolution around the sun!
Obama danced with Ellen Degeneres.

I was just wondering - what has been your biggest change of view in 2008?
Or, what was your greatest addition to what you already knew... that is, what truth has deepened for you, in understanding?

If you still can't respond... what book or author was most pivotal to your year?

I wonder what secret mysteries will unravel themselves before us in 2009. Only time will tell!

For me, I'd say the most important thing I learned is that self-love(not to be mistaken with conceit) is more important than self-discipline. Not being hard on yourself IS a form of discipline, a loving discipline.