 I believe it was Rev Leroy Allison that said “We spend too much time living in the ‘what if’ and need to learn to live in the ‘what is.’ Accepting our present reality seems to be hard for us as an adult. Our emotional state usually arises from the internal protesting towards it.
In fact we get so wrapped up in this internal battle, we lose months of our time, years even, between moments when we ponder our life a bit more and resolve to make changes. Most people don’t take regular time to relax and still the mind a little, there’s just too much ‘to do’. This week I have been contemplating the topic more than usual, my little grey tabby didn’t survive her kidney disease and so we begrudgingly said farewell. In a detached way, I wondered whether this experience of death would be different from previous experiences I've had given all my pontificating about living in the moment. I cried, even though I believe we are all connected, in life and in life after life, but I can no longer reach out and stroke her fur, I can no longer hear her chirpy little meow talk that greeted me every time we were near. Nothing I think or feel can change the fact that she's not physically here. However, what I think can change my experience of it. Only last week I wrote about leaning into the curve balls, living in the present, and so life decided to throw me another. When close ones die, it gets us thinking about the life we are living. Those who face dying tell us they wish they had listened less to others and lived a life more aligned with their own desires. How many times each day do you waste time rebelling against ‘what is’ in your mind? The toilet seat that has been left up, the person next to you on the train with garlic breath, the kids squabbling with each other, the friend that never calls, the boss expecting you to just go along with some silly protocol, the fact that you even have to go to work at all? One of the reasons we love children and animals so much is they seem to revel in the present moment far more than we, they still see magic all around them. We, however, chew things over in our minds and create magnificent stories within seconds. Generally we tell ourselves fabulous tales of how others have done things deliberately to us, and so we feel the persecution and sink further into our misery. We also experience others doing this to themselves, friends or loved ones unload, which just adds to the bad vibes. So what can we do about all these thoughts and feelings we experience that are just slowing us down, creating a fog around ‘what is’? Change what you can, accept what you can’t. It comes down to neutralizing the effects. In the moment, if you feel especially upset, it’s better to remove yourself and get moving, burn some of that negative energy off, walk off some steam. Once you’re there, or if you’ve started at a less extreme state of emotion, start to generalise your thoughts, replay the story from another perspective, one that doesn’t put you at the centre of the drama. Most importantly, be yourself. I reflected this week how animals have their own personalities, even their own baggage. My older cat has always been wary, if approached from her peripheral vision she’ll turn and swipe, if challenged by another cat she’ll valiantly stand her ground. In contrast, that little grey tabby was a resounding example of simple presence and love. Not once did she fight, bite or swipe. Nothing ever fazed her; she just ignored any challenge and carried right on with her affectionate ways. What an amazing gift in my life, and beautiful memory. Taking regular time for yourself to get absorbed in activities that help you tune out to the ‘stuff’ and tune into who you are is a necessity, it’s certainly not an indulgence. As I watch my children grow up, I’m acutely aware of all the expectations that get put upon them, ‘rules’ that they are supposed to follow. When I think of the layers and layers of these that get added over the years, it’s no wonder we get stuck in a bit of a fog about who we really are. Accepting this, start to delayer. Spend more time in ‘what is’, you will soon notice more of what you are feeling towards things, ideas, or people. Use this as a guide to getting to know the real you. Accept what comes up, you may not be the person you think you are. There is only now, this moment, this body, this life, this experience. Accepting the moment doesn’t mean you accept a future made up of the same moments – use now to guide you to what you do want, then action it. Even if that action is only becoming aware of what you don’t want. Once you look at your life through different lenses you can't undo it, awareness is created. Inspiration follows, you start to notice more of who you really are, what you really want, act on your inspiration. The fact you’re reading this article shows you already have some level of awareness that something is out of whack in your life. I’m not going to pretend it’s easy to strip away all those layers you’ve gathered over the years, you won’t suddenly wake up tomorrow with a childlike innocence about the world. But as you work on it, piece by piece, peace returns, exuberance returns, and – most importantly - you return. Living ‘what is’, choosing this moment, aware of who you truly are and what you truly want, is a life worth living. This article was originally published on LinkedIn. photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/40883175@N06/14331575962">Highline Elation</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">(license)</a>
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 Photo by Joshua Clay Life can throw you curve balls, we all know this - the question is how you respond when it happens. Who you are - how you respond to life's challenges - will determine the quality of your own experience and those around you. Many philosophers and teachers have pointed out that now, this present moment, is all we have. Yet many of us live in the past or live for the future.
Learning to live life in the now doesn’t mean life won’t throw you challenges. It’s more related to the perspective you have on those challenges, Erkhart Tolle teaches that optimally you want to still the mind and become an observer who is unattached to the outcome. At first I wondered what the point was of anything if I was unattached to it, isn’t that part of this human experience, that we feel things in response to the life around us? As I began to explore the idea more, I realised that being unattached to the outcome didn’t mean I no longer cared about anything. It’s about the futility of trying to change things that already are. That is not to say you don’t take a different course in the future. As Reinhold Neibuhr famously said “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”. Of course this is easier said than done. I often catch my own responses to the challenges of life, and muse at what an imperfect being I am. So I learn from the experience and recommit to living life in the now. Whether it’s an unexpected result at the clinic, or in a performance review, or a redundancy at work, an illness in the family, or a loved one deciding to take their life in a different direction – how we respond makes a huge difference to the quality of our own wellbeing. This week as we have been settling into our new home in a new city, it became apparent our youngest cat was very sick. Pre-children, our cats were like our kids, and I have to confess in the mayhem that ensues from having little ones born into your life, the cats took somewhat of a back seat. I had noticed that she was a bit depressed and somewhat underweight in recent months, but I had put it down to upset over the move. As it turns out, she has irreversible kidney damage. At only 6 years old, we’d been expecting her to be around for another 10 years or more, and we just weren’t ready to let her go. Neither did we want her to suffer. Through my tears there came a point when I suddenly realised that, no matter how much I wanted her to stay, it wasn’t my decision; it was hers. She would either decide her time is up and leave, or she’d choose to stay a bit longer. I couldn’t impose my will, I could only support her in her choice. Although she has bounced back a little from death’s door and is now home, her prognosis isn’t wonderful. However, I am grateful for this time we have now and are making sure to feed her a specific diet that will improve the quality of whatever life she has remaining. Controlling the things we can. That lack of control is the curve ball. As humans we have a tendency to try and control everything that happens in our life, but we can’t. Everyone has their own free will, and, no matter how much you may want something of someone, you might not get it. I used to see that in the office a lot where a manager would simply tell people to do something without any real discussion, understanding or (crucially) buy in. As a result the culture was not one of lasting positive change but rather one of fear. While the Lego movie epitomizes this in a really humorous way, it’s a rather sad indication of the all too prevalent modus operandi, certainly in the western world. Frequently I’d watch managers physically or metaphorically scratch their heads when challenged by their superiors about a poor outcome, saying “but I told them”. Not all curve balls are negative of course, some are amazing, a long awaited pregnancy when all hope had been lost, a marriage proposal, a promotion or a lotto win. Regardless of what they are, the essence of a curve ball is the unexpected nature, at least in your mind. On some level you will probably have recognized what was occurring, just as I can now see signs I had noticed with my cat in hindsight. It can be hard to accept that our mind plays such a huge part in the quality of our life, that it’s not what happens but how we respond. You can choose to be a victim, or you can accept that you are the creator of your own reality. Either way, you’re right. However, if you are a leader of people or want to be, and want to be successful in doing that, not only do you have to master this, you also have to learn to teach it to others, pointing out what’s in it for them as you bring them on the journey. Change is the norm in this modern world, and the cultures that are deliberately cultivated and supported around this are the ones that thrive. Imagine a world where people deal with change in a healthy way as the norm, how amazing would that be? It starts with you, who you are in these moments. Is your mind battling against what is, or have you let go of the futility of such thoughts? Start with the easy things, the queue at the traffic lights, the unanswered call, the colleague who is endlessly talking, the appointment that is already late. Taking control of curve balls, ironically, is simply about accepting the things you can't change in the moment. Choose to accept the moment and it will surprise you how things start to turn around rather than spiral. Focus on the things you can control and you'll build such positive momentum you'll be knocking challenges out of the park. This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  A thought is a curious thing, once observed, if it’s negative it loses its power; its grip on you. The energy dissipates because your inner knowing sees it in the context of that bigger picture of your life. However, if the thought is positive – aligned with what you truly want out of life – let it snowball, it creates a positive momentum and great results if you’ll let it.
This last week we have been continuing to settle in our new home, new city. When I say settling, I mean, continuing to get things out of boxes, continuing to take two steps forward and one step backwards with electrics, plumbing and a kitchen renovation, kids starting at their new kindergarten and childcare, cats still locked in to get them used to their new environment (and not enjoying being locked in with little kids). Amid the stresses and strains I catch myself being someone I don’t like, letting negative thoughts take over. As we take a small backward step with our kitchen, perhaps a handle missing, or a cabinet maker who forgot to turn up, I lose perspective and start to grumble to my partner. Here's the start of a bad snowball, I say one thing, he plays devil’s advocate and tries to smooth it out; vice versa. Suddenly the story is growing and it’s not about a scheduling error at the kitchen company, I‘ve jumped from there to the kind of person my partner is, his character and the choices I’ve made in choosing him as a life partner. Sound familiar? Of course, things cool off and you gain a little more perspective and life moves on. However, in the process, look at all that bad energy created, bad vibes. Of course, children are very sensitive to all of these things, as are animals. They are not in the specifics, they are just picking up on the energy, suddenly they are tuning in at a lower frequency – squabbling starts, and it snowballs further. If you accept the premise that everything is energy, and our thoughts and feelings emit energy, what if that energy – once created – hangs around like an invisible bubble? If all energy vibrates at a different frequency (like radio waves, great analogy Esther Hicks), you begin to realise that if you are tuned to the wrong frequency you can pick up on a lot of ‘stuff’ hanging around out there. Controversially Erkhart Tolle talks specifically about premenstrual women, whose mood – if not caught at the outset and recognised for what it is – picks up on the energy of persecution of women through the ages and snowballs. Being a woman myself, I admit to first feeling a little outraged at this. Woe betide men who make derisory comments on this topic (“oh, that explains it; it’s that time again"). Of course, when I let this cogitate with my inner knowing, I have to admit it makes more than a little sense. Play out these scenarios in your own life, they happens every day at home and at work. Think of how often a comment in a meeting suddenly leads to an attack (at least in your own mind) on your character, or a colleague’s character. It can be overwhelming when you start looking at life through these lenses. When you think of all the bad energy you create and pick up on, not just of other people you are currently interacting with, but generations passed who have inhabited the same space, it starts to feel like a futile situation. It’s not, it’s really simple, you just need to tune in at a different frequency. It's not that we are trying to never have a negative thought or experience. If negative thought exists as a result of bad experiences – and bad experiences result from negative thought – we don’t want to dwell there long. We do want to use these experiences as a contrast though, to let us know what we do want. Therefore if you aim to spend 80% of your time on the positive thoughts and experiences, that would seem like a good balance. Easy to say and – I know – harder to live, especially when you’ve spent years out of balance, stuck more often than you’d like in a quagmire of negative thought and bad energy. There is much advice and information available on the how, but the ones I like best are:
The mind is a wonderful thing when applied to creating and growing more of what you really want, but if you are finding yourself trapped in a spiral of negative thoughts and feelings, be deliberate about moving in the direction of what you do want, it will change the momentum of your life. This article was originally published on LinkedIn. photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/56044438@N00/3266544581">freedom</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">(license)</a>  Photo by Iwanto Arif Our mind is a magnificent machine, but as I’ve said before, it’s akin to the computer that thinks it’s human. Many believe they are their mind.
Yet there is a deeper knowing within each of us that we can tend to ignore. Instead of quieting the chaos in our head, we dwell on things, amplify them, and they grow like a snowball. When we fixate on the thoughts in our mind, we can never be present, we are stuck in the past or in the future, but we are not really here, now, this moment. There’s a term that has been coined for a new movement, mindfulness, which is interesting as it describes the root cause it’s designed to tackle rather than the practice itself, the illness rather than the cure so to speak; an oxymoron. Mindfulness’ practices have of course been around as long as humans, but lost respectability among the masses. In its more modern naming the masses are taking note; the masses of stressed out, frazzled people who would otherwise have rejected meditation as a bit hippy or new age. Anything that brings us to our senses has to be a good thing. It’s amazing how many phrases we commonly use, like ‘bring us to our senses’ that contradict what people often express as their more cynical viewpoint about life and it’s deeper meaning, and the way others might go about connecting with that. Our senses are many, yet we rely on our 'rational' mind to try and interpret them. In truth, there’s a part of you that interprets the world around you and it’s congruence to the path in life you truly want to take far quicker. If you wake up in the morning and take some time for contemplation before you leap out of bed and into the frenetic flow of the day, you will connect far more easily with the things that are really important to you and those you want to achieve. This is the time in the day to set your intentions, start with the big picture in mind, rather than the inevitable endless stream of emails that will surely be waiting. It’s easy to make excuses about why it’s not possible to do that. I know, I’ve spent the last few years of my life being woken through the night by my daughters and feeling like I’m experiencing some sort of sleep deprivation torture. But I’ve been taking time lately to make sure I hit the reset button. I have a choice when I'm awoken - resistance or acceptance. Often I get woken and think “no, no, no, it can’t be time to get up already”. Then I catch myself, I stop the thought before it starts to grow like a snowball. In the past I’d have been thinking “If she starts whining for milk I’ll scream” or “Why can’t he get his lazy butt out of bed for once instead of pretending to still be asleep” or worse. Caught unaware and called from our sleep most of us are less than congenial. Lately I’ve started to be more ‘mindful’ and hear Kim Eng’s voice (I regularly do her yoga class on DVD) “accept the is-ness of this moment”. Then I quickly follow that with my intention for the day of “unconditional love”. I’ve been amazed at how these quick flashes of thought in the morning have reset the tone for the day. The unthought-of ruminations that had started to appear like shadows in my mind suddenly recede and the sun comes out. Well, maybe not the sun, but certainly not the raincloud and lightening thunderstorms of yesteryear. When we get trapped in our head, and negative thought patterns start to kick in, it’s important for your wellbeing to catch them quickly and move on. My daughter tripped and hurt her arm this week, taking the top layer of skin off, resulting in some antiseptic being applied at bedtime. As it started to sting, she felt pain and began to cry. She was so tired that I kept thinking she’d fall asleep, but instead she was fighting it, fixated on the pain. After much crying and attempts to sooth her I said “you’re stuck in your head, thinking about it is making it a lot worse”. She said miserably “I am?” I started to distract her by retelling the stories about when she was a baby, a topic I know she loves, and then a thought crossed my mind. She wasn’t going to sleep anytime soon, so I asked her whether she’d like to get up and look at her baby book. We had a wonderful time looking through it together. At last she was ready for bed, distracted enough that she no longer felt the pain. When you start to get trapped in your head, anywhere, anytime, make a point of breaking the hold the thought has. Until you do you’ve lost your perspective. And that perspective is the one of the bigger picture for your life. Most of you can’t articulate what that is, but you know it deep inside. You feel good when you’re in tune with it, and bad when you’re not. So if you’re stuck in some vortex of self destruction, deliberately break out. The best thing you can do for your wellbeing and your success in life is to regularly and proactively go out of your mind. I mean this in a healthy way of course. Whether it's ‘Mindfulness’, meditation, or simply an activity you really enjoy that lets you relax, it’s important for you to tune in, turn on and get the best of you each day. This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  Photo by Matthew Weibe We know instinctively that we should be aiming to be happy, because it feels better, it feels good, great even. But few of us can actually say that, for the most part, we are consistently happy throughout our lives.
What if your job in this life is simply to figure out what feels good to you and do more of it? You can use your feelings at any point in time as your guide to how you’re doing on the job. The truth for most of us is, quoted from one of my childrens' books by Janan Cain, “Feelings come and feelings go, you never know quite what they’ll be. Happy, mad, glad or sad, they’re all a part of me.” - we’re a mixed bag. Thank goodness for that mixed bag, the contrasts. I remember fathoming out as I was growing up that, in order to know great happiness, you have to first know what great sadness is; otherwise good would feel, well, mediocre, normal. Too often though we try and cut out feeling bad altogether, preferring to stay in a state of numbness over pain, or getting quick fix euphoria. Remember, feeling is at the heart of our human experience. The last episode of Grey’s Anatomy I watched, one of the doctors had a moment where he realised he kept running away each time things got tough, and that ‘running away’ is different for each of us. For him it meant taking another tour of duty, for the doctor he was talking to it was drugs, but the epiphany he had was the things they were running away from are actually a vital part of our humanity. Many of us have developed a ‘coping mechanism’ when things are tough, whether it’s a big glass of wine, or simply tearing into the cleaning at home. But what kind of life is one where you’re ‘coping’? Yes, painful things happen, really painful sometimes. The worst thing you can do is try to run away from that pain, because all that happens is it grows, you give more energy to it by focusing on not wanting it. I’ve seen people let it affect them their whole lives, passing it on through families and generations. Actually it’s sadly common, Look at some of the world’s quarrels now, borne of generations. As a Scot I can tell you the fierce hatred of the Sassenach’s (English) still runs rife in our patriot blood. Mine rises to the occasion watching sporting events, despite having been born in England and having some wonderful friends and family there. Feeling bad (whether it’s despair, resentment, anger, or any other variant) is simply your inner self telling you that you’re off track from what you’re truly wanting. I’m not saying you need to dwell there, in fact, it’s not helpful if you do. Instead, feel into it, then let it go – let it point you towards what you do want. When you face it, and feel into is, it’s overwhelming at first; but it soon starts to dissipate. Despair can turn to unworthiness, then to anger, then to disappointment before moving into more neutral territory like frustration. Eventually you start to feel hope and, from there, more positive feelings arise. Equally, when you’re feeling good, don’t just dive on into the next thing in your day. Take some time to just let that feeling soak into each cell, you’re in tune with yourself, celebrate it by staying in tune. Start to hardwire happiness into your brain as Dr Rick Hansen would say. When you catch yourself thinking about how tough you’ve got it in life, the quickest way to turn those negative thoughts around is gratitude. While gratitude has become a bit of a throw away word, clichéd almost, too rarely do we actually feel into it in its truest form. As I’m in the process of moving cities and saying goodbye to many people at the moment, it’s been a great opportunity to thank those people for what they’ve added to my life. I’ve even been grateful that we took over the new house early, with my partner going ahead to get it painted while I stay back and pack up our old house and look after the kids. In situations that are stressful, the combination of my own ‘wanting time to absorb and reflect’ nature, mixed with my partner’s ‘dive right in’ nature can exacerbate the whole experience. As hard as it’s been, separately moving through this time has had its upsides and has helped me appreciate his contribution greatly. When you’re struggling to think of things to be grateful for, go big, general even. The more general you are, the less you can argue with yourself. Who isn’t grateful that the sun comes up each morning and fills the world with vibrant colour? That helps our plants to grow, giving us air to breathe. For the rain that comes sustaining us and giving more life than it ever takes away. Even the things you’ve been looking at through the lens of ‘life is tough’ are a blessing. In knowing what you don’t want, you can start to discern what you do want far more specifically. Yes, your aim is to be happy; but it’s not ‘never to be sad’. That said, don't dwell there, growing the story in your mind and firmly setting anchor. Use those negative experiences as a contrast, use them to guide you quite deliberately towards what you do want - the best and happiest version of your life. This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  Photo by Aaron Burden 'Stop and smell the roses' is an expression most will have heard, but how often have you done it; literally or figuratively? It’s amazing how we can be so busy in our lives that we don’t take even 30 seconds to simply just still the mind and be present in our own lives.
J Neville Ward wrote “Death helps us see what is worth trusting and loving and what is a waste of time.” This is no doubt true but what if instead, throughout our lives, we were tuned in and turned on to what is truly important to us? You can be. This week I had a sudden recollection of a conversation I’d had with my chiropractor a number of years ago. He would always ask me to recount how my neck/shoulders/back felt at various points throughout the day. As much as I’d try to remember, I discovered I was going through my days not really present, like driving on autopilot, when you suddenly wonder how you got here with no memory of the route. I used to talk about my brain thawing after a few hours of sleep, because I’d usually waken up in the early hours of the morning with absolute clarity about what actions I needed to take the next day, often getting up to write lists or emails. Then the starter pistol would go off the next morning and I’d start spinning plates again. With constant fog brain and a dull sense of unfulfillment, there were rare moments when I was awake where I would achieve clarity, usually when I had my annual break from the rat race. Then I started to take time to deliberately still my mind. If you’ve ever tried meditation in the traditional sense you’ll know it’s incredibly hard to sit still and not start drifting back to your thoughts, starting with how uncomfortable you are feeling sitting still, you’re soon thinking about the shopping list or a disagreement you’ve had with someone and then you realise you’re deep in thought, defeating the purpose. Alternatives are activities that you enjoy that don’t take much thought, or require a singular focus. Personally I like yoga, the kind where you hold stretches, because there’s just enough movement and discomfort to keep me in the moment – deep breaths are necessary to distract from what I’d describe as a cathartic borderline pain. This is another form of meditation. You can also start to leverage moments in your life that are currently frustrating. In a world where companies think they’re giving great service if they answer 80% of their calls in 20 seconds, what if you take that 20 seconds for yourself, tune out to the music, and just focus on your breath – letting any thoughts that come up drift on past. Do the same at traffic lights, in queues, waiting for the elevator – you will be amazed at the restorative effect. We have gotten so used to identifying with the thoughts in our mind that we think we are that voice in our head. Sure, it’s a component of who we are, but if you identify with it alone, you will miss out on the clarity that comes from your inner knowing, your inner self, the real you. In my posts the central premise of my writing is to encourage the reader to be who you were born to be. When you are present in the world without all the hang ups and misconceptions about yourself that you’ve collected through the years, and all the ‘rules’ of the family, community, country that you live in, you are a person who feels inspired, driven to action, fulfilled. Present. Can you imagine going to work with people who are actually present? Not on autopilot thinking ahead in the conversation, truly listening and – not only that – they are people who are passionate about what they are doing, inspired to be there. Productivity would shoot up, engagement would be a foregone conclusion, customer satisfaction and profits would swell beyond anything we see today. It’s great that you’re taking a moment of your day to read this. How about you take another just to take a deep breath and look around you right now, right where you are sitting. See the colours? See the details? See people’s faces? Hear the sounds? Keep breathing. How does your body feel? Any aches or pains? What about the inner you, can you feel into it? Just observe and be present for a moment in the world you are in. Now go have a great day. This article was originally published on LinikedIn.  In growing up you have become immersed in a shroud of rules, rules that simply do not serve you; shed the shroud and unveil the life you intended to life.
Did you ever stop to think what a ludicrous world we live in? We invent so many rules it is ridiculous. There’s the written rules, the doctrines of religion, law, politics, then there’s the unwritten rules, society’s conventions. Tune into your own moral compass and let go of the cumbersome impossibility of living to everyone else’s standards. Freedom is the essence of our soul, every emotion we ever experience is in relation to how free we feel. We are too willing to put up with feeling bad, feeling powerless, it’s time to start tuning in to your inner knowing and turning the dial to feeling good. As I would walk to work each day from the ferry, there was one guy I’d often see – well, hear - who would walk along with his headset on and belt out a tuneless rendition of “Whiskey in the Jar”. He was completely sober and, as tuneless as his singing was, it brought about a frission of energy, a wonderful zest for life and ‘letting go’ we all paid attention to. Like many of you, I was encultured into a life full of ‘rules’. From the minute you wake up to the minute you go to sleep your life is dictated by rules. Rules that we, as humans, have simply ‘made up’. Let me give you another example. When my daughter started at daycare last year, she was almost 4, and – unknown to me at the time – the centre had ‘rules for eating lunch’. They raved about the healthy meals that the kids get cooked, and I assumed it was the process of their friends eating a new variety of food that would encourage the new kids to give it a go, surprising themselves that something new tasted good. But no, at 11.30am the kids get their lunch, and it’s a cooked meal. I don’t know about you, but I can’t face anything with any taste until after about 1pm, prior to that I need bland offerings. However, each to their own. The kids are told time and again (the teachers call this ‘encouraged’ but I’ll call it what it is to illustrate my point) “eat your veges, they are good for you”. Like Pavlov’s dogs they are applauded for eating the good stuff and punished if they don’t. “Oh no, we don’t punish them” I was told. Mm, so re-presenting the broccoli they didn’t eat at lunch and withholding the afternoon tea until it’s eaten isn’t punishment? No longer is my daughter in an environment where she can choose what she eats and when, she can’t go with her flow. There’s no need to dictate what they eat, provide a healthy variety and kids – heck let’s widen this to anyone – will choose the food and quantities their body needs. Yes, sugar and refined flour will mess with our chemistry and therefore our choices, but I did say provide a healthy variety of choices. We have rules and more rules. Laws that make no sense. I have decided the next time I get stopped for speeding and they ask why I was driving over the limit I’ll say “because I felt it was safe to do so” as it will be the truth. I saw an article in the AA magazine on ‘form’ versus road signage. It’s been proven that a tree lined road will slow motorists down, whereas open landscaping speeds things up, much more effectively than signage. You are born knowing right from wrong. Truly, you are. I know it’s hard to believe given the level of stuffing we’ve all had knocked out of us in the process of growing up. Most of us are conditioned into thinking we need someone to tell us the rules or society will collapse into chaos. This was in actual fact what the daycare centre told me “we can’t let the kids choose, there would be chaos!” Who are these people who decide the ‘rules’ we follow? Politics has become a game of power and ego. In religious doctrines you will find rules taking you down a rabbit hole further and further from the essence of its teaching. You are born with an inner knowing, innate wisdom. All growth adds to our collective consciousness, we evolve and our children are born wiser than we. Just in the last few decades alone we have evolved at a pace beyond previous decades, centuries even, with many social intolerances now starting to dissipate. It is a battle of the mind versus inner wisdom and knowing. There is a deeper part of you, and you know it exists because you connect with it in every moment of clarity you have, that knows right from wrong. You know what is right for you, and you don’t need others to tell you what it is. As adults we have years of conditioning to unravel before we can get there consistently. You can start today though, you get clarity through stilling your mind. As I wrote in Live the Best Version of Your Life the most common regret of the dying is “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me”. If you wonder who the real you is, just start with any activity that helps you to free your mind of those cloudy, crowding “what if’s” – go for a walk, dance to loud music in your living room, take a ride on your bike, go for a swim, whatever works for you, that helps bring you back into balance. It’s from these points of clarity that you make great decisions about what works for you and what doesn’t. Over time you can learn to get in that feeling, that headspace, more readily, and for longer. Reading through some of my earlier takes you through this step by step. In the meantime, go break a few rules. Start with things that are inconsequential, maybe you’ll take a pee on the hillside when you go for a walk, or do a rendition of “Whiskey in the jar” on the bus, whatever it is, be free to do what is right and feels good for you. This article was originally posted on LinkedIn. photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/16903262@N02/1802363801">Ice hole swimming</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">(license)</a>  When we feel powerless, it doesn’t feel good, and our automatic reaction is to try and take control of something, anything, which tends not to end well. As Mohandas Gandhi said “The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace.” That starts with us.
Things happen in our life that we can’t control in the moment - people die, relationships break up, jobs get made redundant. Each and every day, in our various relationships, we experience moments where we don’t feel as though we have a choice: going to work when you’re feeling under the weather because someone else had already called in sick, making the kids’ lunches because your partner has left for work without doing it, going to a meeting that feels like a waste of time because your boss has made it clear it’s not optional; the list is endless. Then there’s the interactions with people that upset us. We tend to take things very personally and attribute the worst possible reasons for people’s motives, when in actual fact, most of the time it will have very little to do with us. One day last week I dropped my daughter and niece off at their daycare. Usually they go in and hang their bags beside each others, but my niece wanted to hang hers on its own that day, which really upset my daughter. Callie (let’s call her that) felt powerless in a situation where her cousin kept moving her bag every time she put hers next to it. The story playing in Callie’s head was “My cousin doesn’t want to be friends anymore, she doesn’t like me. I don’t want to be here if I’m not wanted.” And so the upset began. Of course, for my niece, the story was quite different, and it’s hard to know exactly what her reasons were (4 year olds are pretty good at talking, but not usually at explaining the psychology behind all their actions). What I do know is it had nothing to do with wanting to be friends or not. She quite cheerily told me she still wanted Callie as her friend, and then stood there waiting to play while Callie was getting all upset (empathy is only developing at this stage!). Callie doesn’t go to that daycare every day but her cousin does, so perhaps she’s just being independent so she doesn’t create a routine that causes her to miss Callie when she’s not there. Perhaps it has nothing at all to do with Callie, and she’s feeling powerless over another issue, maybe she didn’t get her choice of breakfast that morning or wanted to play with some toys that had to stay at home, there are endless possibilities. I use an example of 4 year olds here, but I’ve seen many examples of this – and I’ll confess I’ve also been party to many – in the workplace, which show just as little empathy. All too often we attribute motives to others’ behaviour based on the stories in our own head, which are based on our values, beliefs and circumstances, not theirs. So what can you do in situations where you are starting to feel powerless? Let’s keep it simple, if you think about the many ways you can feel, let’s put them into two buckets, bad and good. We all know fear, anxiety, impatience, resentment, anger, frustration, grief and doubt feel bad; and that peace, calm, patience, commitment, allowing, acceptance, happiness and confidence feel good. Driving those feelings tends to be the extent of power we think we have in any situation. Your aim is to feel good, when you feel good, you maintain a more healthy perspective and maintain a sense of power within. Our degree of acceptance or resistance to the present moment will determine how we feel about it. Erkhart Tolle teaches us the “Power of Now”, the futility of resisting ‘what is’. Living in the present moment, accepting whatever arises, isn’t the same as being a victim or a doormat. It’s about not giving away power and feeling bad about something you cannot change. If you’re feeling bad, it’s time to change the stories playing in your head. In fact, try and catch those stories as fast as you can. Abraham-Hicks teaches us that 17 seconds is all it takes for a thought to catch momentum; soon you have a whole story, an epilogue, going on in your head. Stop! Think big picture here, you want to feel good; you want to keep your power within. Start to generalize your thoughts, put yourself in the other person’s shoes and start attributing their behavior to some other motives that depersonalize it for you. Go and do something that makes you feel good, whether it’s sticking on your iPod for a rendition of Pharrell William’s “Happy” and walking round the block, or getting up to get into the groove, do something, anything (healthy!). Lift yourself up. It’s not about moral high ground, it’s about perspective. We tend to get embroiled in the detail of our own lives and see ourselves as very separate from others. When, in reality, we are all connected and our actions affect many beyond our reach or knowing. What if your life has a much bigger purpose than the one you see today, and the things that are happening are happening for a reason? That is why you often hear expressions like “hindsight is a wonderful thing”, “what’s for you won’t go by you” and “all’s well that ends well”. If you feel bad, make it your mission to feel good. Give people a break, and give yourself a break. Put a stop to those stories created in your mind, instead, surrender to your inner knowing - that is where you’ll find your power. This article was originally published on LinkedIn. photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/51643976@N02/5834991471">Her smile 23/52</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">(license)</a>  Photo by Sander Smeekes We are becoming lonelier, and it’s killing us. This is the basic premise of an article I was sent this week, supported with lots of facts and figures, and sited social isolation as the key driver. I have a slightly different take on it, that is, people have become something they are not in order to fit into a culture that is not even serving us anymore. People have become disconnected from who they really are and who they were born to be. If you are not connected with your own inner self, how can you truly connect with the world around you?
As a child of the 70’s, I was intrigued by a recent Australian drama series called Puberty Blues. Its focus around the lives of young teens really took me back to that time when we emerge into the world forever changed by our hormones. The show is fairly gritty and depicts the young men as arrogant louts who need to maintain an image of cool by ‘dissing’ the chicks. And the girls of course generally abide by this etiquette of the time and get themselves into all sorts of hot water because they really felt they couldn’t say no to the guys. What really struck me about this series was an interview I read in a magazine with the young actors who were asked whether the lives they were acting out bore any resemblance to their own. Their answers were heartening, the guys were blown away by how macho and stand offish the young men they play are, the guys of today being much more comfortable with being more tactile around their mates and talking about their feelings. The girls talked about the young women of today being much more comfortable dictating their own terms. I was listening to an Abraham Hicks talk recently where I heard wise words that really resonated with this. The essence was that we get wrapped up in trying to impart our wisdom to the younger generations, when in actual fact they are born wiser. Knowledge is accumulative in the greater consciousness, our experiences and lessons are woven into the very fabric of life itself and slowly but surely we evolve. Things change, probably over about four generations, pretty quick really. Technology aside, when I think back to where we were only a few decades ago when I was growing up: Americans was locked in the Cold War with Russia, in Europe we still had a wall around East Germany, South Africa still had a system of Apartheid, being gay was not something anyone (not even a celebrity) admitted to – ever, people still debated whether smoking was bad for your health; and the role of men and women was changing. Allan and Barbara Pease have written much on the topic of the male/female differences (I like Why Men Don’t Listen and Women Can’t Read Maps), and I always thank them for introducing the idea to me that all men and women have a degree of typically masculine versus typically feminine traits. Most of my generation in Scotland were the product of homes where the mum was a housewife and the dad worked, yet we were being educated that woman had equal rights and many are now out there trying to be superheroes, with the generations following looking at the stressed, burnt out versions of their parents and deciding that is not who they want to be. Good. Being born a woman in this life has been an interesting experience. For all talk of ‘equal rights’, what we saw in the home was not that. We had no template for what it even meant. This is evident in our corporate cultures today. Even in companies that espouse attractive values, generally the reality is still a construct that fits and plays upon our more masculine traits (particularly in the way decision making takes place) with little time invested in two-way communication and the growth of our people and culture. I’ve worked closely with senior managers and ‘leaders’ in Executive positions for the last 15 years, I’ve seen women become more masculine time and again in a bid to be successful in the workplace. One was determined not to become like that because of a female boss she’d worked for who was publicly renowned for being masculine in her manner. Yet I'd observe her in meetings with her mannerisms and speech all but saying ‘watch me as I sit here and scratch my imaginary balls as I show you who the alpha dog is’. On the flip side, she’d often talk of her young teenage kids, texting or taking calls from them, and we’d see a more feminine side – but where had that woman gone in her workplace dealings? It’s an interesting world alright. The point I keep coming back to is this, we were all born with characteristics, traits and talents that – for one reason or another – we have felt the need to cover up or change in order to survive. This does not make for a happy life. We have organizations filled with people who feel like they are one person on the inside and another to the outside world, turning up each day to a prescribed job description, managed by performance reviews whose outcome must fit a bell curve. Imagine organizations filled with people who are in tune with themselves, bought in to the vision of the organization and allowed to simply let their strengths and passions flow. How do we get from here to there? We have made some enormous strides in our society, and we evolve – eventually. One person at a time, one decision at a time. So how miserable do you need to be? How lonely? What’s it going to take for you to come out and be who you are? What will it take for you to choose happy? This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  Photo by Jeremy Ricketts If you often feel disconnected or wish for more peace or meaning in your life, it’s probably a good indicator that the life you are living is not aligned with the one you – the real you – wants.
There are two versions of you. There’s the real you, the one that you get glimpses of now and again, particularly on a relaxing holiday. Then there’s the cosseted, task focused version of you that operates day to day, lost so much in your thoughts that you are disconnected from both the real you and the living breathing world around you; I’m not talking about the ‘news’ here, I’m talking about life. Take your regular route to work for example, do you pay much attention to it? For over 3 years I had the good fortune to commute into the city via ferry, a passage through the islands of the Hauraki Gulf that lead into Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour. Sounds idyllic. Yet there I was, ‘device’ in hand, responding to email after email, doing the weekly online grocery shopping in between, or buying someone’s birthday present, or making an appointment, or following up on a bill, suddenly remembering five other things I had to do and scheduling them in. Sound familiar? On the odd occasion the ferry captain would pull over so we could watch dolphins or whales and, suddenly, attention shifted, people came alive and momentarily connected as we all took our devices to the back of the boat to photograph these beautiful creatures and post how lucky we are in our various social media forums. In contrast, before I started writing today, I took a walk around the neighbourhood. I no longer commute, so I make a conscious effort to go out and get some exercise and connect with the world I’m living in. It’s a calm day, with only a very light breeze, enough to bring the scent of flowers if your senses are tuned in. It’s the kind of day that lulls you into a slower pace just to still the rustling of your clothes and hear the birds twittering and tweeting to each other, a much gentler form of social media. Before I took the walk, I had deliberately taken a short time out to still my mind using a breathing practice. If I hadn’t, the walk would probably have been more like my previous commutes because there’s always more to do than time permits. Incorporating a period where you deliberately still your mind each day is critical to finding peace and connecting with the real you. Of course, what I’m talking about here is ‘consciously’ switching off as opposed to numbing your mind through that bottle of wine, beer or any other mind altering substance. I’m not saying don’t have those, your choice, but those aren’t what I’m recommending in pursuit of lasting inner peace and happiness. At first it’s not easy to just switch out of your usual cosseted state, you need to make the conscious effort, it takes focus. Schedule it in, whatever ‘it’ means to you, any activity that allows you to consciously switch off. For me, it’s meditation, yoga or a walk; for my partner it’s a bike ride in the mountains, a swim or a spa. Whether it’s 15 minutes or an hour, just do it regularly and you will be amazed at the results that follow. For those of you a bit more scientifically minded, thanks to my osteopath, I came across the work of Dr Rick Hansen in Hardwiring Happiness this week, he has some great tips for really helping you leverage your more positive experiences, making the feelings and state of wellbeing associated with them last - and explains the neuroscience behind it all. As you practice stilling your mind regularly, you’ll notice more. You suddenly catch yourself in the midst of your usual daily whirlwind and you take a moment to notice the world around you. It might be the expression on someone’s face that you hadn’t really been watching, or the carpet in a corporate corridor, or the beauty of a tree outside. Then you notice your feelings on the inside begin to slow down, feel less frantic, less stressful. You wonder why you hadn’t prioritized regular time to still your mind long ago, how did you miss this simple step you wonder. As I was reminded today by a wise man, in regularly stilling your mind, you won’t necessarily become powerful, famous or rich, but you will feel at peace and connected to everything around you – including the real you. In this state you feel happier, your true passions come to light, your inner knowing provides the answers you’ve been seeking and, in all honesty, you’ll be a much nicer person to be around in an amazingly enriched world. This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  Photo by Joshua Earle You have a long list of goals and desires, you wish your life could be better, but... "I can't do it because..." or some version of this.
If only you were to realise that the power to dissolve your fears is a power you hold within you. It's a battle between the mind and the inner self. People tell me I’m showing great courage in sharing and following what's in my heart, they are sure I will be successful. But I believe courage is not the opposite of fear, surrender is. You only need to look at the examples in your life where you really wanted something; it might be a new home, or taking a relationship to the next step, or ending a relationship. Your mind will have had many questions, fear will have arisen. Despite that, something in you knew it was the right thing to do. You've never looked back and, of course, it all worked out. The converse is true too. You will have examples of decisions you've made where you just knew it wasn't the right thing for you, but you could rationalise in your mind why you were making that decision. Inevitably, on some level of your wellbeing, it won't have worked out so well. For years now I’ve harvested a desire to follow a more fulfilling path. If I buy into the stories my mind concocts, the "what if..." stories, yes, it takes courage. If I trust my inner voice and trust it will all work out, if I surrender to that, it will. A friend told me yesterday, when she talked of painting her deck, her bones and muscles ached but she felt fulfilled. In Who Are You Not? - Strip Away What Is Not Real we talked about signs and signals that arise from your wellbeing when you are not being authentic, or true to your own nature. You wouldn’t mistake the aching my friend described as a signal that she wasn’t in alignment with her inner self; because she was fulfilling her deeper desires of tending the home she’s lovingly created, her haven. We inherently understand fulfillment as an excellent indicator that, at our deepest level of wellbeing, we are being true to ourselves. Having been around the same old circuit so many times in my work life, waking up in the morning and then being spat out at the end of each day; empty and unfulfilled, I really know the contrast with how I want to feel. No experience is wasted, the negative ones are providing us with both an example of what we don't want and the motivation to go after what we do want. Yes, if I can rid myself of aching muscles that would be wonderful, but ultimately I ache to feel fulfilled. To feel fulfilled you simply need to be yourself. When I look at the 'achievements' in my life so far, moving to the other side of the world was a move that took a lot of focus and energy, birthing my children was much the same. Both rank among my most fulfilling achievements. The other things you see on my profile, not so much. It's not that the roles I've been doing aren't worthy roles. Those roles, filled by someone being true to their own nature, would be fulfilling. Fulfilled people are happier. more passionate people. Imagine that, a workplace filled with happy, fulfilled people. Productivity would sky rocket! Fear of the unknown is what stops us. Our wonderful, practical minds step in with the “what if..” questions, fear arises and the feeling of it stops us in our tracks. On cusp of change now, having surrendered to the deeper knowing within that I must, absolutely must, let the real me emerge, the 'what if' questions creep in when I let them. Writing a post, I momentarily fear, “who will read it? If they read it, what will they think?” Then people read it, great! But then only few comment because they in turn also fear “what will others think?” And yet, in writing this and in reading this we are all in the process of becoming more aware of who we really are. When fear arises, change gear, deliberately do something different that will make you feel good - listen to music, dance, walk, cycle, stroke the cat, whatever makes you feel good. Let go of all thought and still the mind. Only then, ask the question, am I on the right path? The answers deeper within are the true answers. You must seek those answers. Then you can be who you are, the person born with gifts, talents and traits that, if fulfilled, will bring you joy, and in turn you will bring that joy to the world. This article was originally published on LinkedIn.  Photo by David Marcu As you begin to understand more about who you are not, your true self will begin to emerge.
Layer by layer as we scrutinise the perceptions we hold about ourselves, and start to make a deliberate effort to shed some that are no longer useful, you are likely to feel uncomfortable or even lost for a while. At first, you will have less of a sense of self. Instead you might slowly (rather than instantly) stop attracting situations in which you’d use that old armory. Old beliefs about yourself can be difficult to shake and we might have to reason them out in many facets of our life. In emotional terms, despair turns to anger which turns to frustration and finally you have apathy. Apathy is your turning point. It’s also a vulnerable point, because you feel empty. Understand though, it is necessary for something to be emptied to allow another thing to emerge. Try to be patient and use the many signals around you, the reflections of ourselves that life presents back, to discover who you truly are. It can be confusing; the world is sending us many signals at any one time. The most important thing you can do is be aware of how your wellbeing is responding to what the world reflects in its mirror. Only you can know whether something is right for you. We live in a world of contrast. Without that contrast you wouldn’t experience the strength of feeling joy or happiness can bring without having first felt the contrasting negative emotions. There is no rush, but you might feel compelled to rush, to fill the void in you that has opened up. Shedding the layers of who you’ve become is revealing if you let it be, but it also makes us feel exposed. Realising that life is meant to be easy might be a challenge. Many of us resist the idea because we’ve been taught the exact opposite. We chalk up our negative physical, mental, emotional or spiritual experiences to the necessary 'cost' of success. Life will be full of contrasting experiences, yes, but it’s the ones that make you feel good (in all aspects of your wellbeing) that are a reflection of the real you. There is no cost you have to keep paying. If something isn't working for you, work on letting it go. Look around you for the reflections of who you are. Listening to others, or asking for their help, can sometimes be a really smart way to try and figure out your true nature under those layers. Other people, assuming they are objective, can more clearly see who we are being. Every day we interact with people in a world that can tell us so much about who we are, if we listen. Our children are a very rich source for this, though we might not always like what we hear – or see. A personal coach, or even a counselor, can be invaluable. Our life is a mirror, it reflects back to us who we are being, but you can often struggle to see the wood from the trees; particularly if you have little time or headspace. One exercise, that is quite powerful, is to write a list of all the people you admire and what you admire about them. This will give you a list of traits that live, to some extent, within yourself. A journal is another way of unwinding some of your thoughts on this. For more practical tips on the process, I really like Dr Robin Smith's Rediscover Who You Are series on Oprah.com. There are many pointers to your authentic self, listen to those, and then listen within to discern what is right for you. While discovering who you really are is a lifelong journey, I encourage you to start. A world filled with people being who they really are, is a much better world than the one we live in today, for everyone, It starts with you. This article was originally Published on LinkedIn.  Photo by Todd Quakenbush Why do so few of us realize that life is meant to be simple? We come equipped with a nature, talents and gifts. We just have to grow up and use them. Therein lies the problem; in the process of ‘growing up’ we take on so much of other people’s ‘stuff’, added on layer by layer, we lose sight of who we are.
Our true self is passionate and joyful. The one with the layers added, not so much. Imagine the joy in turning up to a workplace, or being in a relationship, where people (including you) are in tune with themselves? To be who you are , your own true nature, how do you strip away the ‘nurture’ and why? Is that not part of who we are? Well, no. It’s part of the armory, or ‘layers’, we’ve developed in order to get through, get along, to even exist; beliefs we’ve adopted about ourselves. When I was heading into higher education, my mathematics teacher told me it would be a loss if I didn’t take the subject. Not wanting to let him down, I took his advice and adopted a ‘I obviously have talent for math’ layer. Bad decision. Two years into uni, on a summer break, I was working nights in a bar on a holiday island off the coast of Spain. Instead of spending my days at the beach, I was studying for the second and final resit of the math exam; and spending all the money I’d earned on a flight home to take it. Pass, or leave uni. I learned enough that summer to both pass the exam and finally drop the subject. Unfortunately though, because I’d initially been guided by my ‘talent for math’ belief I was, by then, locked into a Bachelor of Science degree. Sadly the only subjects I had taken in that first couple of years that I was actually interested in, and had sailed through, were in the Arts faculty (psychology and management studies). Luckily I then decided to go on and take a postgraduate diploma in Human Resources, much more my kind thing. If only I hadn’t minded momentarily hurting the feelings of my math teacher at the outset though. Yes, I finally learned at uni math wasn’t for me, but I then held the misguided notion that was because it involved letters (as an aside, whoever put letters and algorithms into math was surely sadistic). But the ‘I have a talent for math’ layer was strong and I held on to the idea that I was good at numbers… Finally after years of doing accounts at home and in business, and budgets at work, I recognized that the knots in my tummy, the items I wanted to hurl across the room, the people I’d been terse with, the headaches I’d borne and the imaginary screaming in my head were all fairly good indicators that I actually don’t like numbers. That was in my late 30’s. When you’ve been stuck in a layer and you finally shed it, you wonder why on earth it took you so long to realize it. The relief is amazing. To strip off the layers there’s a hard way and an easy way. The hard way is Groundhog Day – another job, another project, another relationship, another friendship, playing out the same old scenarios. When you’re in those spirals it’s hard to even distinguish what the issue is, you just know you’re not happy. It’s the proverbial not being able to see the wood from the trees. Often it’s easier to blame the scenario or another person than to figure out what, within you, is not a match. There are easier ways – with a deliberate shift to the plural here. They all start with a desire to be happier, and a decision that you will put in the focus required to make that happen. Let’s talk more about that next time. This world doesn’t need the stressed out, unhappy, grumpy version of you, it needs the one who feels good about who they are and what they do, so who are you – truly? This article was originally published on LinkedIn. |
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