There are a multitude of useful life skills that one could think of, but the ones I want you to think about here are the ones just about anyone can master to some degree - the mental attitudes and skills that humans can learn that ease their passage through life - the oil that allows the engine to run smoothly.
In this context they are thus not skills in the sense of being able to lay bricks or do a heart transplant - rather these useful life skills are in fact life principles because they can be applied with equal effectiveness to a wide variety of areas in our lives - such as relationships, business, friendships, money, marriage and so on.

Although these useful life skills are probably better recognised in today's world, they have been around since the dawn of mankind, and have been used by man either deliberately or unwittingly ever since. Personal energy, goals, perception, awareness, perseverance and so on are life skills that man has learned, developed and used throughout history to win wars, make great fortunes, make life changing scientific discoveries etc.

By becoming aware of some of these useful life skills, and utilising them in your day-to-day life, one starts seeing the world in a different light. Problems become opportunities; the impossible becomes possible; in short life can become exciting and invigorating again.

Of course it is one thing to be aware of the existence of these useful life skills and quite another to apply them on a consistent and on-going basis to maximise the results you want. Life tends to get in the way and because we are dealing with mental perceptions and attitudes, there is nothing physical to hang your hat on and work at and so it is quite easy to let the opportunity quietly slip away out of your conscious mind.

And that would be a big pity because while it takes effort (another useful life skill) to maintain the concentration necessary to make these useful life skills part and parcel of your everyday life, the rewards more than justify the effort in the long run.

So, what are some of these useful life skills that we can utilise to improve our lives. Let us pick one - perception - and have a brief look at how this simple life principle can have a profound effect on your life.

Perception is how we look at and interpret events. Our interpretation influences our reaction which in turn creates an outcome. If we are aware of this chain of events, then we can consciously influence our perception and therefore choose a response that will result in a favourable outcome for us.

The trick here is to understand that our knee jerk perception and response to an event might not create the best outcome for us. Luckily we can train our minds to hold fire and consider how best to perceive the event and then to offer a response. This response will almost always have better consequences than our "original "response.

The funny thing about most useful life skills is that they are very simple in concept but hugely powerful when applied consistently.

The tragedy for many people in this age of complicated technology is that they don't believe anything will work unless it is devilishly complicated. I hope you know better.

Keith Perrett is a qualified Veterinarian and business owner. He has found that the more useful life skills he practices, the better life gets. Get a free report on how you can utilise one simple life principle to get instant results at http://www.i-challenge-you.com