The Monkey nudges me.  We look at the clock.  Thirty minutes gone by adjusting some administrative aspects of our website (by the way, do you like the “new” old look?).  I had intended to spend no more than 15 minutes creating a new post for the blog, but instead devoted 30 precious minutes to the cause of updating some things on the back end of monkeyinmymind.com.

Not that doing that admin stuff is unimportant.  We are not saying that at all.  Instead what I am realizing is that one useful aid to goal accomplishment is to become more conscious of how we while away the hours. 

How to Determine Your Priorities

Your list of priorities begins with exactly what you’re doing right now in this moment.  Look around you.  Go ahead.  What time is it?  What are you doing?  Where are you?  Is reading this what you intended to do when you sat down at your computer or iPhone just now? 

If it is, then welcome!  Good to see you again. 

If not, then stop reading this and take a moment to center yourself and take these steps:

1. Ask yourself if this activity is your highest priority at this moment. 
2. Listen for the answer. 
3. Proceed accordingly.

If your priorities in life, the things or people or activities that are most important to you, are not in accordance with your desires, or in other words, if you say something is important or a priority to you, but your actions speak otherwise, then you will find goal accomplishment to be a long, arduous, and winding road.

Living consciously simply means to live in a manner that balances action with introspection.  Act.  Introspect.  Repeat, guiding our actions through choices towards our desires.  In time we may effortlessly combine the two spheres into one vital force of consciousness, moving through the world fueled by love and the Universal creative force.

The other day the Monkey and I shared with you a post about our DESIRE STATEMENT we had created over two years ago.

What Is A Desire Statement?

As I discussed, a DESIRE STATEMENT is nothing more than a clear description of how we’d like our lives to unfold. I posted up my desire statement as it related to my business affairs, an area I thought needed working on back then.

Re-reading our old Desire Statement, I am now a witness to the simple evaluation of whether or not things have been panning out like I had envisioned. In some areas my visions have manifested in profound fashion, in other areas, progress is slower.

Most interesting, however, hasn’t been analyzing whether or not my intentions are manifesting. Instead, what has provided me with tremendous insight are the words I chose back then to describe an ideal life. As a result, it is now more apparent than ever to me to always be conscious of the words I choose to speak when I am describing my life experience.

The Word is Mightier Than the Fist

I found that the wording of my old DESIRE STATEMENT, which you can view by clicking here, was a bit convoluted.

An example:

“I’m in the process of attracting and allowing all that I need to do, know, and have, to attract and allow my ideal business life to manifest.”

Try eating a saltine and saying that a few times!

What exactly am I envisioning here?  No wonder the universe is having trouble delivering my vision.  My vision is convoluted!  In the above statement I seem to be asking to be in the “process” of something.  Who wants to be in the process of something?  Screw process!  I want to live in the manifested present.

Realizing my lack of energetic clarity, I updated my Desire Statement here simply to read:

I am allowing my ideal business life to manifest.

Which statement do you think is easier to focus on?

Or this:

“I love knowing I make money in my sleep.”

I think I originally wrote this in order to feel excited and in a field of love as I contemplated my intentions.  But why not assume that all creation occurs in a field of unlimited love and focus instead upon the message.  How about just saying:

“I make money in my sleep, enough to live a dream life for my family and me.”

With the understanding that the words we choose to describe both our present experiences and our future intentions are as vital and necessary, if not more important, than the actions we take physically to manifest our desires. Words are powerful because they shape our visions and then guide our actions. They are also useful tools that we can use to compare our dreams to reality.

Anyway, it was a fun exercise to learn where I can improve in the selection of powerful words that will help to literally change my life experience in a more efficient and expedient manner.

My Updated Desire Statement: My Ideal Business Life

I am allowing my ideal business life to manifest. I make money in my sleep, enough to live a dream life for my family and me. I am my own boss, working creatively and passionately in all fields of endeavor.  I do exciting and inspiring work in a beautiful, spacious workspace.  I occasionally travel to interesting or exciting places on business.  I create my own schedule.  My business is healthy and sustainable to the natural environment, my family, and myself. I am grateful that my company supports my lifestyle and provides plenty of opportunity to attain life-work balance, including time to vacation all over the world. My family is set for life; I help others experience abundance.  My work is smooth, supporting, sustainable, and best of all: I get paid handsomely to do what I love!!

Is There Anything In Your Desire Statement to Re-Word?

Give it a try and drop the Monkey and Me a line…

Two years ago I attended a “law of attraction” workshop. One of the main projects we completed during the workshop was formulating a “desire statement.”

A desire statement

A desire statement is the process of creating an intention for an area of one’s life. In this case, I chose the area of my “business life” because I felt as though that aspect of my life was underperforming and could potentially be the source of a lot of abundance and satisfaction if I could only “tidy up” a few things.

The purpose of the desire statement is to address each major component of the area of interest and do two things:

1) define success and happiness as it relates to you personally for each particular component

2) create a palpable vision surrounding this new understanding.

This vision is extremely powerful. The vision is a tool, a “mental shortcut,” that we can use during our everyday lives and our meditation and/or visualization sessions to access Universal Creative Power with immediate effect. With practice and focus we can manifest virtually instantaneous results.

My Desire Statement: 2 Years Ago:

I’m in the process of attracting and allowing all that I need to do, know, and have, to attract and allow my ideal business life to manifest. I love knowing that I make money in my sleep. I get excited about making plenty of money for my family and me to live our dream lives. I am my own boss, working in a super-creative field. in a beautiful, spacious workspace with an easy commute. I love creating my own schedule, and it fills me with joy to know that I am doing exciting and inspiring work. I love knowing my business is sustainable to the natural environment, to myself, and to my family. I am so grateful that my company supports my lifestyle and provides plenty of time to do what I want, including vacationing all over the world. I get excited about creating balance in my life between my work and my family. I love knowing that my family will be set for life so I can focus on helping the rest of the world achieve abundance. My work is smooth, supporting, sustainable, and best of all: I get paid handsomely to do what I love!!

What’s Your Desire Statement?

Would you like to have a look at an area of your life and create a vision for improving its manifested physical expression? Simply state several declarations describing what you’d see and feel in this particular area of your life it was rolling along exactly in accordance with your intentions and desires. This can be profoundly powerful exercise, especially if you devote time and energy to follow through on your intentions and take note of all the things currently manifesting in your life, through either conscious or unconsious input on your part.

Next post I’ll share how my visions have been manifesting and what my updated desire statement is for the summer of 2009.

It’s 6:30 am and the Monkey is embarking on another day of living the dream. I arose around 10 minutes to 6am and the first thing I did this morning was gaze upon my “vision board.”

Here’s what’s on it:

In the upper left hand corner is a photograph of a lindal cedar home that I wish to manifest. The home is surrounded by woods and has a large “great room.” Oddly enough, it looks quite similar to the home I manifested last fall. We plan to build a dining room on the back of our house that will closely resemble the great room in the photograph on my board.

Below that is a card that I received from my mother. It shows a little kid with their eyes closed and the words, “Pray hard.”

Below that is a five-dollar bill, defaced by a sharpie to look as though it were a $500,000 bill. Written across the bill are the words: “MONEY FLOWS FREQUENTLY AND EASILY.”

Back at the top of the board, in the center, is the logo for mutual fund company I use for my Roth IRA: “PAX WORLD FUNDS.”

Below that is a photo of a buddha looking over a mountainside, with the chant, “NAM MYOHO REGNE KYO” written underneath.

Below that is a small oscar statuette I printed off the internet and cut-out.

Next to that is a photograph of a briefcase containing a lot of cash.

Below that is a piece of paper with the type-written words: “DESIRE STATEMENT: MY IDEAL BUSINESS LIFE” that I realize needs some major revising.

Finally, in the upper right hand corner is a piece of paper I received at a meeting with the words, “The ABC’s of Happiness” written on top. Below that, the writer, Robert Valett, goes through the alphabet, ascribing a trait or quality to each letter of the alphabet.

After gazing upon my vision board, concentrating on each image, I understood once again what a powerful tool this vision board is, making a vow to concentrate on it again every morning.

What’s on your vision board?

Image by Gürkan Kurt

The Monkey is back.

Just had my second child, Juliet Love, born June 26, 2008.

She is adorable and sweet and quiet.

In other news I have written about 35 pages of my screenplay entitled, OVER SEAS.  The first act is basically done.  I occassionally make small revisions as I come across new ideas while going about my day.  There will be more on that soon in this blog.

My aim is to update Monkey In My Mind with smaller pieces more frequently.

Beginning with this: There is a simple tool that most of us think we utilize, but actually don’t, at least effectively, anyway.

I am talking about basic planning.

I find that too terribly often the first thing I do when I get up in the morning is get lost in an ocean of physical and mental noise, like turning on the tv, listening to voicemails, getting verbally assaulted by the radio, checking the CNN.com homepage, or rummaging around my various email inboxes.

When instead, the thing I need to be doing is centering myself, finding my breath, and then setting an intention for the day, which is most easily captured within the format of a daily plan.

So here is my plan for the morning:

8:00 am post this piece

8-8:05 breathe

8:05-8:35 screenplay: attempt to add: flashback scene of Gus receiving his father’s beret in front of the SEND ME crest. 

Also attempt to add: Gus demonstrates his knowledge of afghan customs and current politics when he sits down with Naseer for the first time.

8:40 Depart for Auto Glass shop

10:00 Return home to receive guests and spec out plans for Isabel’s new sandbox construction project in the front yard with Harvey.

Meet with Lauren to discuss the rest of the day.

Desired projects:

Clean/organize garage

Purchase weed wacker

Work on our website, www.organicgreenmommy.com.

Oddly enough, compiling that list made me think about the things I am doing in my own life and I realized that with all of my current obligations, my screenwriting dream was getting completely ignored, even as I was building this blog.

Nearly two months later, I am engrossed in my latest writing project.  I will be checking in here from to time to time with updates and features as I find more time.

Although I was a literature major in college, lately I find the only thing my mind is interested in consuming for my daily reading is non-fiction, and particularly books that will provide insight and tools for me to live a better life.

Using the genre of “Personal Development” as a springboard for my search, I decided to seek out a list of the most effective, most popular, and best-selling Personal Development books not only as resource for my readers, but as a tool for myself.

Determining The Rankings: Sales, Effectiveness, Cultural Reach

Instead of simply compiling a list from memory based on my personal take on Personal Development books that I have already read, I decided to take a more scientific approach to my search process. As this list is a resource for myself to expand my own awareness and development, obviously I couldn’t rely only on the books that I’ve already read. In addition, I didn’t want my personal bias to come into play.

So what I did was use Amazon to find out what their top 200 best-selling books were, and assigned a score for each of these books. I then did another search, this time sorting the books according to customer reviews, both in the quantity of the actual reviews and the aggregate score that the customer reviewers assigned to the books. I deemed this to be a measure of effectiveness, and assigned a score for each of these books. Finally, I did a Google search for each and every one of these books, tabulating how many web pages referred to each book, so as to measure what I call Cultural Reach, or how much that particular book as permeated the collective consciousness as measured by Google.

There were a few books that made it on the lists that either weren’t really “Personal Development” books, like books about investing, or had too narrow of a scope, like a book for men only about how to please women. These books I eliminated from the list.

Finally, with a score in a each of these three categories, I again rank-ordered the books, assigning a final score, which I believe is a compelling, unbiased measure of Top 100 Personal Development books.

Didn’t Make The List?

There are a lot of great books that aren’t on this list. Perhaps Amazon categorizes them differently or their sales don’t match up to current sales figures for these other books. Regardless, if you know of a book out there that you’ve had success with that didn’t make this list, please shoot me an email and let me know what it was and why you think it should be on this list.

So without further ado, here is the list…

1. The Secret by Rhonda Byrne

2. A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose by Eckhart Tolle

3. The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and Jeffrey Zaslow

4. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey

5. How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie

6. The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren

7. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen

8. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment by Eckhart Tolle

9. The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich by Timothy Ferriss

10. Who Moved My Cheese?: An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life by Spencer Johnson and Kenneth Blanchard

11. The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene

12. You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay and Joan Perrin Falquet

13. Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton

14. Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life’s Greatest Lesson by Mitch Albom

15. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert B. Cialdini

16. My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey by Jill Bolte Taylor

17. The Year of Living Biblically: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible by A. J. Jacobs

18. How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish

19. The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz

20. The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron

21. What Got You Here Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful by Marshall Goldsmith and Mark Reiter

22. Change Your Thoughts – Change Your Life: Living the Wisdom of the Tao by Wayne W. Dyer

23. A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future by Daniel H. Pink

24. Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Bruce M. Patton, William L. Ury, and Roger Fisher

25. Women & Money: Owning the Power to Control Your Destiny by Suze Orman

26. The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman

27. The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason

28. The Success Principles: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be by Jack Canfield and Janet Switzer

29. Quiet Strength: The Principles, Practices, and Priorities of a Winning Life by Tony Dungy and Nathan Whitaker

30. Difficult Conversations by Douglas Stone, Sheila Heen, and Roger Fisher

31. Change Your Brain, Change Your Life: The Breakthrough Program for Conquering Anxiety, Depression, Obsessiveness, Anger, and Impulsiveness by Daniel G. Amen

32. Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: The Classic Guide to Understanding the Opposite Sex by John Gray

33. Body for Life: 12 Weeks to Mental and Physical Strength by Bill Phillips and Michael D’Orso

34. Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ by Daniel Goleman

35. Ask & It Is Given by Jerry Hicks and Esther Hicks

36. The Power of Intention by Wayne W. Dyer

37. Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy by David D. Burns

38. Your Money or Your Life: Transforming Your Relationship With Money & Achieving Financial Independence by Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin

39. PostSecret: Extraordinary Confessions from Ordinary Lives by Frank Warren

40. The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke by Suze Orman

41. Boundaries Participant’s GuideRevised: When To Say Yes, How to Say No to Take Control of Your Life by Henry Cloud and John Townsend

42. Merle’s Door: Lessons from a Freethinking Dog by Ted Kerasote and Patrick Lawlor

43. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill

44. Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie

45. It’s All Too Much: An Easy Plan for Living a Richer Life with Less Stuff by Peter Walsh

46. Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert

47. Getting the Love You Want by Harville Hendrix

48. I Can Make You Thin: The Revolutionary System Used by More Than 3 Million People by Paul McKenna

49. Debt Cures “They” Don’t Want You to Know About by Kevin Trudeau

50. Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust by Immaculee Ilibagiza

51. Law of Attraction: The Science of Attracting More of What You Want and Less of What You Don’t by Michael J. Losier

52. Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle

53. The One Minute Manager by Kenneth H. Blanchard and Spencer Johnson

54. Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff

55. Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler, Cass R. Sunstein, and Sean Pratt

56. The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything by Guy Kawasaki and Paul Boehmer

57. The UltraMind Solution: Fix Your Broken Brain by Healing Your Body First by Mark Hyman

58. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values by Robert M. Pirsig

59. The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything by Stephen M.R. Covey, Stephen R. Covey, and Rebecca R. Merrill

60. Money, and the Law of Attraction: Learning to Attract Wealth, Health, and Happiness by Esther Hicks and Jerry Hicks

61. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Take Hold and Others Come Unstuck by Chip Heath and Dan Heath

62. The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter, & Miracles by Bruce H. Lipton

63. Come On People: On the Path from Victims to Victors by Bill Cosby and Alvin F. Poussaint

64. When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron

65. No Limits: The Will to Succeed by Michael Phelps and Alan Abrahamson

66. Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else by Geoff Colvin

67. The Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker

68. Younger Next Year: A Man’s Guide to Living Like 50 Until You’re 80 and Beyond by Chris Crowley, Henry S. Lodge, Don Leslie, and Rick Adamson

69. Influence: Science and Practice by Robert B Cialdini

70. My Secret: A PostSecret Book by Frank Warren

71. Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg and Arun Gandhi

72. How to Talk to Anyone: 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Relationships by Leil Lowndes

73. Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow by Elizabeth Lesser

74. Leadership and Self Deception: Getting Out of the Box by The Arbinger Institute

75. The Definitive Book of Body Language by Barbara Pease and Allan Pease

76. Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy by Sarah Ban Breathnach

77. The Mindful Way through Depression: Freeing Yourself from Chronic Unhappiness by J. Mark G. Williams, John D. Teasdale, Zindel V. Segal, and Jon Kabat-Zinn

78. The Power of Positive Thinking by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale

79. A Lifetime of Secrets: A PostSecret Book by Frank Warren

80. This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women by Jay Allison and Dan Gediman

81. Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential by Joel Osteen

82. How to Stop Worrying and Start Living by Dale Carnegie

83. Happiness Now!: Timeless Wisdom for Feeling Good FAST by Robert Holden

84. The Power of Soul: The Way to Heal, Rejuvenate, Transform, and Enlighten All Life by Zhi Gang Sha

85. The Road Less Traveled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth by M. Scott Peck

86. Feel the Fear . . . and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers

87. Battlefield of the Mind: Winning the Battle in Your Mind by Joyce Meyer

88. Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth by Richard J. Foster

89. Magnificent Mind at Any Age: Natural Ways to Unleash Your Brain’s Maximum Potential by Daniel G. Amen

90. The Secret Lives of Men and Women: A PostSecret Book by Frank Warren

91. Go Put Your Strengths to Work: 6 Powerful Steps to Achieve Outstanding Performance by Marcus Buckingham

92. The Great Eight: How to Be Happy (Even When You Have Every Reason to be Miserable) by Scott Hamilton and Ken Baker

93. Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment by Deepak Chopra

94. The Art of Extreme Self-Care: Transform Your Life One Month at a Time by Cheryl Richardson

95. Do What You Are: Discover the Perfect Career for You Through the Secrets of Personality Type by Paul D. Tieger and Barbara Barron

96. Heal Your Body by Louise Hay

97. The Anxiety & Phobia Workbook by Edmund J. Bourne

98. The Secret Daily Teachings by Rhonda Byrne

99. Spiritual Liberation: Fulfilling Your Soul’s Potential by Michael Bernard Beckwith

100. The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living by Dalai Lama and Howard C. Cutler

Like many others with an eye on the “internet Personal Development scene” I was taken aback at the beginning of 2009 when the popular blogger Steve Pavlina announced to the world that he was ditching a traditional marriage with his partner of 15 years for the practice of Polyamory (“many loves”), meaning that he (and his wife, Erin) had decided to open up their marriage in order to prevent it from degrading even further into a possible divorce.

His announcement was followed by a lengthy and detailed defense of his intentions that has received quite a bit of attention over the past few weeks, both positive and negative. Many of his readers, whether they personally practiced Polyamory or not, wrote in to his forums and other blogs to support his intentions and applaud his courage for announcing it so publicly. Others have taken issue with his stance on the issue of Polyamory and marriage, while still others, like myself in a post here or Pure Doxyk in a post here found aspects of his rationalization disturbing, indicating hints of selfishness or self-absorption that seemed to run contrary to his previous track record of providing usuable personal development tools and pieces of advice on his blog.

Now that the dust has settled a bit on the whole affair, I am starting to realize that my response in this blog was a bit of a rant and may have indeed run contrary to my stated purpose of this blog, to: Quiet the Monkeymind, the noisy thing in our brain that judges the world and others in order to prevent us from achieving moment-to-moment consciousness.

Is Steve Pavlina Onto Something, Then?

Well, no, not at least as far as me and the Monkey are concerned. But the realization I have recently discovered is that his post, as it exists within my personal consciousness, is nothing more than any other person, event, or thing that we summon into our life experience for the purpose of doing one of two things:

1) Growing, or

2) Perpetuating a lack of consciousness.

In other words, I am now beginning to understand that this talk of Polyamory isn’t about the merits of Monogamy versus sleeping with multiple partners, Steve Pavlina’s ego, or the opinions of thousands of others. Instead, what this is is an opportunity, a Call to Action, for me to personally examine the intimate relationships in my life, particularly my marriage, and attempt to draw something of value so as to improve, modify, or disband those relationships, as a means to create greater happiness and a deeper connection to the Universal Mind.

I guess what I’m saying is that I took issue with many of the points that Steve had made about his realtionship, his thoughts on Polyamory, and his mission in life to expand his own consciousness. I made the focus of my blog post about Steve and my perception that he has been misguided by his ego. In short, I was taking his personal inventory as opposed to using his message as an opportunity to evaluate my own relationship. What I am finding is that I had a lot to criticize about Steve but I also objectively should have a lot of criticisms about how I am handling my own marriage.

Six-Year Roller Coaster Ride

I will spare the details of the ups and downs of my marriage perhaps for a later post, but will say this: my relationship, while rewarding and important, has not been a walk in the park by any stretch of the imagination. We have had to deal with a lot of external issues and crises (9-11, unemployment, unplanned pregnancy, career struggles, legal problems, substance abuse related issues) that have strained a relationship that probably could have been better served by emotional and economic stability. What I’m trying to say here is that my wife and I love each other very much, but our personalities are intense, our dreams are big, and we both embody the extreme manifestation of masculine and feminine energy, respectively. In other words, while we share many of the same tastes and values, our communication patterns often create the perception that our intentions and desires are polarly opposed. Where I am weak she is strong and her weaknesses are my strengths. We have, subconsiously perhaps, not chosen an easy path by selecting each other as our life partners, as we daily encounter multiple “opporunities for growth” in learning how to deal with each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

So why I am going on about this? Well, now I am understanding that Pavlina’s post and the introspection and discussion my wife and I have had on the issues of love, fidelity, sex, and marriage have surfaced to the forefront of my consciousness for a reason. I went off on Steve for his choice but perhaps should have instead used it as a wakeup call asking whether or not I am up to the task of deepening my intimate relationship. If I believe what I said in my response to Steve then my job now is to walk my talk. I realize that there is no better crucible of change than a marriage. Either you change and grow and live happily, or remain the same and live a life of misery. Hopefully if we chose the latter we have the strength and courage to distintegrate the unhealthy marriage. If monogamous marriage is a path to expanded consciousness then I am on the right path for me. But maybe I’ve been siting on the side of the path, pouting there with my arms crossed waiting for someone else to change, while I need to just get back up and keep moving forward with an open heart.

Bad Luck or Intentional Creation?

Photo by: Aaron Gardner

This week I was traveling in Rhode Island on business and spent two nights in a Residence Inn in Coventry, Rhode Island, not too far south of Providence (I guess everyplace in that state isn’t too far south of Providence).

Anyway, when I awoke Thursday morning and checked out of my room, I had a funny feeling as I was walking over to my car, if you define “funny” as that sinking suspicion that your car has been broken into.

As I approached my car, it turned out that my sinking feeling had been a premonition: the passenger side front window of my car was indeed shattered, thousands of bits of tiny green glass littering the seat and floormat on the passenger side.

At first I wasn’t sure if anything had even been taken. I have a Sirius Satellite Radio hardwired to my dash and that night I lazily placed the removable “dashboard” face into one of the console containers in the car, where it still was that morning. I even left a humongous PDA-like device that my company provided me to handle orders, scheduling, and email in the car right next to my Sirius face and there it still was.

So what was the target of this break-in?

About two years ago I stayed in a Marriott hotel in the Meadowlands, New Jersey, within walking distance of the football stadium where the Giants and Jets play. The place, as you might imagine, was a shite-hole and I made myself an easy target by demonstrating my break-in naiveity by leaving a detachable GPS right there stuck to the winshield.Which of course wasn’t there the next morning. What bothered me the most about that break-in wasn’t the fact that thieves took my GPS: they’re replaceable and relatively inexpensive. What really got to me in this particular intrusion was the fact that the thieves also vicked one of those cheapie electronic voice recorders that I always kept in my car to “jot down” thoughts and ideas I had while driving, since I spend so many hours behind the wheel and tend to be very receptive to creative thoughts while in the driver’s seat. It really pained me to think that all of those ideas, ideas for books, blog posts, and screenplays, were lost forever. My mind played with the notion that some stranger was sitting somewhere listening to all of these grand ideas but most likely the person just deleted the whole thing and tried to sell the device like new.

One thing that stuck with me about that first break-in, which in a way is tied to the second break-in, was the fact that displayed prominently on the dashboard in my old car was a small Buddha statuette, that I had placed there to remind me of my divine purpose in life and also to “protect me” while I drove so many hours every week. I thought to myself, how could some thief steal stuff with Buddha staring right at them? How could Buddha allow that to happen, for that matter?

Of course a statuette doesn’t “allow” anything, but I found it to be ironic that yet again, there was Buddha, placed even more prominently in my new car, surveying the inside of my car’s cockpit while this latest pilfering took place. “What did you see, oh little chubby smiling one? ” Then similar thoughts came up: didn’t these thieves realize I was “spiritual?” Didn’t the sight of Buddha dissuade them from their malicious intentions?

After I had reported the break-in to the hotel staff and summoned a cop to come over and file a report did I realize what the subject, or object, of this latest break-in was: a binder that masqueraded as a brief case, that contained a lot of essentially worthless “pitch material” for my sales job. My job requires me to present science and sales information to my accounts during the course of my visits so I purchased this nice binder to hold all of the pages of those presentations protected in three-holed plastic sleeves. The binder itself cost perhaps $90 and was manufactured by the same company who makes Swiss Army Knives so it had a cool look to it and may have given the impression to the thieves that it contained something valuable, and perhaps was even a laptop case holding a computer. Interestingly, I didn’t even use my own money to buy the binder (my company reimbursed me for it) and my insurance completely covered the cost to replace the window with no deductible, so in one way, the break-in and theft didn’t cost me anything. My sales assistant is FedEx-ing me all of the presentations that were taken, so the only thing I truly lost as a result of the incident was time and perhaps some piece of mind, some serenity.

In fact, I gained more than I lost.

What I gained was a reasonably inexpensive lesson that although we are generally safe and secure, it sure helps to help ourselves in that regard by not making ourselves a target for some kind of intrusion. The first night in the hotel I had brought every thing into my room and of course had nothing stolen. The second night I was a bit lazy and left the binder in the car because I knew it was materially worthless, although I of course didn’t realize that it may have appeared to be a bountiful prize containing an expensive computer, or whatever else of value people put into their briefcases.

Is this a message to me to experience more gratitude for the things I already have? I didn’t think what I had was valuable, but somebody else risked getting caught committing a crime in order to obtain something upon which I obviously placed little value.

Now that I’ve been broken into twice, I will be more than certain to esnure that my automobile doesn’t appear to be an enticing target. But more importantly, I would like to learn from this incident to be more thankful for what I have because I could lose it all in an instant.

An Ironic Footnote: Law of Attraction at Work?

One thing I find to be the most interesting about this whole thing is the fact that I had recently been ruminating about ditching this briefcase/binder thing because it was too cumbersome. See, normally I drive around with two briefcases: one that I already described, and the other, a messenger bag-thing, containing a notebook and a laptop computer. When I visit my accounts, I need my laptop, my notebook, and my binder, but usually don’t want to carry both bags slung over both shoulders, so would instead sacrifice one for the other and usually enter my accounts somewhat unprepared.

Over the last week or so, I had been thinking about getting rid of the binder/bag, transferring all of those presentations into a thin, lightweight binder that I could place into the messenger bag containing my computer and notebook, so I would have everything I needed in one bag and therefore be more efficient and streamlined. I was dragging my feet on that move, so I guess the “universe” decided to step in and make that transition happen a bit sooner that I had planned.

You really do get what you ask for. My lesson: if there’s something I’ve been meaning to do, I better do it myself now, or forces outside of myself might just very take care of it for me, and I may or may not like how those forces go about doing it.

I realize that this was a communication from the divine reminding me and The Monkey to be more conscious of our intentions, because quickly or slowly, violently or smoothly, our intentions always have a way of manifesting.

Kar-ma
(kär’ma)
n.
1. The total effect of a person’s actions and conduct during the successive phases of the person’s existence, regarded as determining the person’s destiny.
2. Fate; destiny.

As you may or may not have noticed, for the most part, the NFL articles on Monkeyinmymind are not about X’s and O’s.  Our observations here are only tangentally concerned about gameplans, playcalling, or locker room cliches.   Instead, we are more focused on the transcendent cultural and verily, mythological aspects of this modern-day incarnation of gladiatorial stuggle.

In this light, looking at the eight playoff teams remaining in contention for the NFL Superbowl Championship, the Monkey and I considered some the karmic implications of  the journey ahead for several players and teams, and thought we’d share our observations here.

The Arizona Cardinals, Kurt Warner, and the Greatest Show on Turf Version 2.0

Collision with Destiny?

Kurt Warner, the one-time league and Superbowl MVP, joins what will likely be his last team, the Arizona Cardinals, after being cut from the Rams, signed by the Giants and then benched in New York in favor of young Eli Manning.  His last chance to be a NFL starting quarterback begins to slip away in Arizona thanks to poor play, and Warner is benched again in favor of another highly-touted young draft pick, this time former USC star Matt Leinart. After a few seasons of ocscillating back and forth between the bench and the starting lineup, he finally wrestles the mantle of the starter from Leinart during open competition before the 2008 season, and aided by a corps of superhuman wide receivers, returns his new franchise to relevance.

 Warner helps his team capture a division championship, 10 wins and counting, and a home playoff victory, something this franchise hasn’t accomplished in like half a century. All this after leading the St. Louis Rams to a pair of Superbowls nearly a decade ago.

When Warner led the Rams to Superbowl glory in 2000 (against the Tennesse Titans, in one of the greatest Superbowl games ever), his story was already stuff of legend.  An undrafted free agent, Warner had to cut his teeth in the Arena League and NFL Europe before finally landing in St. Louis to back up starter Trent Green.  If Green hadn’t gone down in a preseason game prior to the 1999 season, the sporting world would likely have never known the Greatest Show on Turf, or the statistical heroics of Kurt Warner, who, should he “complete the circle” in this his 14th professional season and deliver a Superbowl title to the lowly Arizona Cardinals, could go down as one of the game’s greatest quarterbacks.

Interesting plotlines: Should the Cardinals weather the storm in Carolina this weekend and the Eagles fall to the Giants, Warner would face the young quarterback he once mentored and to whom he lost his starting job, Eli Manning, in the NFC Championship game.  Each starting quarterback has already won a title, so the Football Gods might favor Warner putting an exclamation point on his unlikely career with a victory over his old team and a third chance at a Superbowl championship.  And should Warner manage to make it to the big game, it would be sweetly karmic for him to once again face the Tennessee Titans, the team he defeated 9 years ago by a matter of inches.

The Titans of Tennessee, Jeff Fisher, and his Quarterback

Karmic Partners Fisher and Collins

Speaking of the Tennessee Titans, perhaps no head coach in the AFC “deserves” another shot at an NFL title more than Titans Coach Jeff Fisher.  Fisher, the game’s most tenured coach, is emblematic of what an NFL coach should be: steady, effective, humble, and aggressive.  The Football Gods smile upon steady tenacity and would like to not only reward Coach Fisher with another shot at the title, but would also like to honor Titans’ ownership for sticking with their guy over the years and not giving into the “revolving door” syndrome pandemic in the league, whereby frazzled owners constantly hire and fire head coaches in desperate attempts to wrestle up interest and enthusiasm for struggling franchise, at the expense of consistency and a master strategic plan.

Outside of Jeff Fisher, the Football Gods may also show interest in the karmic journey of another grizzled quarterback.  On the path to the Superbowl, the Titans, led by veteran QB Kerry Collins, will have to face the surging Baltimore Ravens, the team that annhiliated Collins and his former team, the New York Giants, 34-7 in the 2001 Superbowl.  Could the Football Gods favor the possibility of Collins redeeming himself against the team that handed him one of the most painful losses of his career?  Now that Collins has a decade of sobriety under his belt and the tools of mental discipline and self-care that accompany such a program of recovery, the Kerry Collins of 2009 and the Kerry Collins of yesteryear are like night and day. 

Now Collins is sober, seasoned, and focused, and like Warner, has taken the starting reigns from a young, highly touted first round draft pick, Vince Young (who ironically faced and defeated Warner’s backup Matt Leinart in one of the most exciting college football games in recent memory).   That Collins is now in a position (leading the #1 seed in the AFC)  that no one with any semblance of a football mind could have predicted prior to the 2008 season, might be an indication of the Football Gods at play to arrange his opportunity to complete his own Karmic Football circle.

Interesting Plotlines:  Should the Titans survive the Divisional and Championship rounds of the AFC Playoffs, either of the two top seeds in the NFC (Giants and Panthers) would be worthy opponents, as these contests would be opportunities for Collins to put the past behind him in facing the team who used their first-ever draft pick on him in 1995 and then later banished him after poor play and even worse off-field behavior (the Panthers) or in facing the team for whom he failed to deliver the title once before (the Giants). 

Donovan McNabb and His Adoring Fans

Good, Bad, and Ugly

It is appropriate that Donovan McNabb, one of the modern game’s most accomplished “athletic” quarterbacks (a moniker he incidentally despises), plays for the same team that also started another fabulously gifted “athletic” quarterback, Randall Cunningham.  While the Philadelphia Eagles have fielded numerous competitive teams over the years and have always been a feared opponent on any team’s schedule, they have never enjoyed a Superbowl Championship and might just be “due” for one.  

Finishing the regular season at 9-6-1, it’s already implausible that this team has advanced as far as they have into the playoffs, and they just very well might be this season’s 2007 New York Giants.  Is the implausibility of their ascent evidence of the Football Gods at play?  Well, only other-wordly forces at work could explain their rebirth after being left for dead in Cincinnati and the unlikely scenarios that had to play out perfectly in their favor (Tampa and Chicago losses along with the Cowboys complete self-destruction) with respect to the NFC Wild Card race? 

And if the Eagles of 2008 are the Giants of 2007, then who is the Eagles potential Superbowl foe, because there’s certainly no opponent as daunting or treacherous as last year’s New England Patriots, arguably one of the greatest teams in the history of the NFL?

Well, there’s nothing that the Football Gods revel in more than a good old redemption story.  Instead of facing down Goliath, like Manning faced down Brady and the Pats, Donovan McNabb will face down an entirely different foe should he make it all the way to the big game: the Philadelphia fans.  

While charismatic and supremely talented, Donovan has been embattled for much of his career in the City of Brotherly Love.  Granted, his play of late had been rather erratic, so much so that Head Coach Andy Reid benched the Pro Bowler during a particularly ugly loss to Baltimore nearly two months ago.  Since his benching, however, Donovan has led his team to a 5-1 mark and has transformed his club into one of the most feared playoff opponents in the National Football Conference.  While criticized at the time for yanking his star in an effort to “create a spark,” it now looks like Coach Reid is the Mastermind who did just that. 

While leading his team back into the ranks of the NFL elite, there is no doubt that McNabb is savoring the opportunity to display to his on-again/off-again fan base just how hard to come by a franchise quarterback is. 

Interesting Plotlines:   From a karmic perspective, the most fitting foe for McNabb and the Eagles to face in the Superbowl would be the Baltimore Ravens, as it was obviously against this team in a losing effort that McNabb was benched.  Only Karmic Football could explain how an event that at the time may have been one of the lowest points of his career could have sparked this most unlikely ascension.  It would only make sense that Donovan would complete the circle of his karmic journey leading his battle-hardened, hardly perfect, 12-6-1 club against the team that in another lifetime, might have brought about the end of his career in Philadelphia.

Lil’ Eli

There Can Be Only One

Two thoughts about Eli Manning’s Football Karma: 

1) What could be a better matchup of “what could have been” than a San Diego Charger-New York Giant Superbowl?  Famously traded for one another following the 2004 NFL Draft, quarterbacks Eli Manning and Philip Rivers are now two of the games brightest young stars at the quarterback position.  While a potential Chargers/Giants scrum might lose a bit of its luster given the fact that Eli already won a championship last season and has proven his worth to the Giants, there is no doubt that seeing these two young quarterbacks lead their teams against one another would be an intriguing intersection of the collective karmic destinies of these two players and their respective franchises.  The only reason I believe the Football Gods might favor Little Eli in a matchup against Rivers and the Chargers is because while swagger is an essential component of success on the fields of friendly strife, the Gods smile upon humility and quiet professionalism, two attributes that hot-headed Philip Rivers doesn’t seem to embody.

2) After living his entire life in the shadow of his famous father and even more famous and accomplished brother, who would have thought that little Eli might actually go down in history as the best of all of the Mannings, at least in terms of accomplishments on the field?  If Superbowl rings are a measure of a quarterback’s excellence and legacy, then Eli has already matched his older brother’s feats and is poised to surpass his accomplishments as the odds-on favorite to win the big one yet again in this year’s Superbowl.  While Peyton’s days certainly aren’t over in the NFL, there is no doubt that Eli achieved Superbowl success earlier in his career than his brother and has perhaps another decade of his professional career still ahead of him, while Peyton may have only 4 or 5 healthy years yet to play.  Only the passage of time will reveal how history views Eli’s career, but there is a distinct possibility that one of the game’s greatest quarterbacks of all time (Peyton Manning) might end up playing second fiddle to his kid brother.