Oh My!

I think many of us associate something like The Power Of Now with ‘living for the moment‘ and not mithering about the past or fretting about the future.

But it recently dawned on me that much of my disorganisation is actually caused by me not following the Power Of Now – or doing stuff as it comes up.

Let me explain how this has been working, or not working, for me. I realised there are so many things which I don’t do when they should be done, which means I have to go back later and pick up from where I left off and sort it out. Or, the other thing that happens is I end up repeating a task simply because I didn’t do the admin at the time.

Here are a few examples:

Creating a new online account but not recording the new username, password, email address used, paypal account or any other associated admin stuff. Why doesn’t it get recorded?

The goal is wrong…If the end result, or goal is to get the account set up then there is a tendency to whiz on to get the thing set up and going, without including all the organisation as part of the job. If the end goal or task included not only the set up but the recording and administration to create a system to use the new tool efficiently, then we’re in with a chance of getting the job finished.

It could be because there is no designated place to record it. Or, where there is a special place like a notebook, it isn’t immediately to hand so the recording gets left until later. But what happens? Well I usually forget to record the details and then when I come to log on again I’ve forgotten the passwords and usernames I was convinced I would remember and on we go.  If you have something to record or file away and you don’t immediately know where it goes – then it doesn’t have a home and you will never be able to recover the information easily.  So create a home.

The Shove It In There And Sort It Out Later…How about all of those receipts and invoices which come into our handbags, pockets and inbox? Well often they stay where they landed or they get shoved into a box to be sorted out later – by which time it’s become a major job.  But how about if at the end of the week we collected all of the receipts together and just popped them into an envelope labelled up for that month.  It doesn’t take any longer than mashing them all down into a shoe box, but how much time has been saved not having to sort them out at the end of the year?  I reckon about 4 hours at least.  And don’t all those 4 hours mount up!!

I’ve put this post in the ‘How To Be Happy’ category because finally I realised how frustrating this disorganisation was becoming, and how it was affecting not only my productivity but my sense of well being.

How frustrating is it to waste 15 minutes trying to find a forgotten password?

Not as frustrating as doing it all again the next day!

What could be done if we reclaimed that 15 minutes back each day?  Well for starters this blog post took me about 15 minutes to write and publish. What else could be done in those rogue 15 minute time slots we throw away on doing stuff twice.

• Make a call to a potential business partner
• Listen or read a chapter of a personal development book
• Have a sit down with a cup of tea and a biscuit and listen to a chapter of the afternoon play
• Chase an unpaid invoice.

And I’m sure you can think of some more enticing activities!

So what does this mean.  In the slivers of time I spend hunting for passwords in places where they haven’t been written down and racking my sore brains for inspiration on what I could have used THIS TIME  for – I could have grown my business, got some cash, improved my mind or just chilled out.

So the next time I create a new account, I’m going to get up and get the damn book where I record them all!  Instead of shoving this weeks receipts into a box with all the little bits of paper I’ve collected over the year, I”m going to put them into the folder for December receipts.  If you’re going to shoving something somewhere to fester until you need it then it might as well be easy to retrieve.

As a writer, I just love this book. It’s a fantastic to dip into and it really brings the craft of writing to life. What’s great is that it goes beyond the technical stuff and gives us a bit of him, how he started writing, how it has affected his him and how writing fits into his life.

If ever there was a lesson in perseverance, this is it and that’s not just him as the man, but as the boy as well. He describes how his pile of rejection slips grew so large he could no longer fit it on the spike. What a dose of reality! Plus it also sets the expectation for anyone else who may aspire to publishing their stories.

The second half of the book has some real life examples of his editing process which certainly gave me hope. If Stephen King can write clumsily and sort it out in the editing – then so can I.

What really struck me however, was the large part played by the reader and their own visualisation as a key part of the art of the story telling.

If you are a writer now, or aspiring to be a writer, either fiction or non-fiction I can recommend this book as inspirational and instructional.

You may be surprised to find this book is sometimes available in UK libraries – but if you do decide to buy it now a few pennies will kerplunk into my writing fund.

Driving to work this morning and listening to the Radio, I started to switch off as the presenter rattled on about the various people who surprised the audience by their performance on Strictly Come Dancing.

Sadly, I am compelled to point out voraciously that I have never actually seen the programme as such, I have gathered up bits of information by osmosis through the news and so on.

As the presenter was going on about the surprising agility of Russel Grant, I almost totally switched off – but not quite. Then it dawned on me – there is a point to Strictly Come Dancing after all. And here it is…

• It’s about people doing things they’ve never done before
• You see people getting over themselves and daring to look a bit silly in front of the camera
• It’s about a shift of beliefs and identity
• It’s about making a change and expanding the boundaries of your experience and possibilities.

Does this mean that I’m going to start watching it?  Probably not.  But I may be aware of who’s taking part and imagining what changes in values and limiting beliefs they’ve brought into their life to make it possible for them.

The Power Of Now

As long as nothing truly ghastly is happening to you as you read this, then you really don’t have anything to worry about do you?  Before you lash out, what I mean is that if you are fed, watered, warm and pain free, then you really DON’T have anything to worry about right now.

But that’s not how it works for most of us – but if our basic needs are taken care of, then what is it we are fretting about?  Well if it’s not what’s happening RIGHT NOW then it must be something which happened in the past and which is still hanging around like Banquo’s ghost, OR, it is something you are anticipating happening in the future from the loss of a loved one to losing your job, your income or your health.  Even worse, it could be both.

But how much of what you worry about actually comes true?

Sadly, these feelings of harking back to the past and fearing the future is true for so many of us.  Just the sheer weight of quotes by famous people shows us this is a widespread and longstanding problem amongst the general population of humans who don’t have to struggle every single day of their lives just to survive until tomorrow.

Here are just a few of my favourite quotes:

“My life has been full of terrible misfortunes most of which never happened”. ~Michel de Montaigne

“How much pain they have cost us, the evils which have never happened”.  ~Thomas Jefferson

“I have learned to live each day as it comes, and not to borrow trouble by dreading tomorrow.  It is the dark menace of the future that makes cowards of us”.  ~Dorothy Day

And my personal best where the author is unknown (so maybe I can claim it) is, “For peace of mind, resign as general manager of the universe”.

But to just cease worrying is easier said than done because worry is a rather comforting habit and like all habits it needs to be broken.  A rather good book is The Power Of Now, A Guide To Spiritual Enlightenment by Eckhart Tolle and he comes up with a rather good technique which I will touch on here.  It all rather harks back to that old stuff I remember hearing about when I first took up Yoga about focusing on what is happening in the pose, so you lose yourself, albeit it temporarily.  Obviously I ignored all that and set up a little competition with myself about how far I could stretch, but focusing on how each muscle is working to keep you in the right posture really is the key.

It works because you can only think of one thing at a time.  Try this out for yourself – think of a tree and think of a horse.  You can’t do it! You can think of a tree and then think of a horse but you can’t think of the both things together unless you think of a horse jumping a tree.

If you are focused upon how something feels, smells or sounds then you really can’t think about anything else and your brain sort of switches off and has a bit of down time.  Peace.  Yes it’s only a temporary reprieve but as you carry on doing this, then the worry habit starts to subside.

Remember also that this is a technique for breaking the habit because it’s easier to move into concentrating about something neutral such as how the floor feels under the ball of your foot, than something positive which could manifest in the future.  Eventually  you are going to be able move your thinking from neutral to positive and powerful area for you.

Amazingly, there is a free copy of The Power Of Now published on www.holybooks.com so you can check it out before you buy.

Related articles

• Nine Tips for Living an Extraordinary Life (imaginethespirit.wordpress.com)
• Eckhart Tolle: Finding Balance (stevebeckow.com)

Image via Wikipedia

We all have the choice to get off one train and step onto another heading for a more beautiful destination.

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely
in an attractive and well preserved body…but rather to skid in sideways – Chardonnay
in one hand – chocolate in the other – body thoroughly used up, totally worn out
and screaming ‘ WOW what a ride! ‘

Think and Grow Rich

There is so so sooo much stuff written about goal setting.  Some may think there’s too much.  But it’s all just peripheral stuff because the key to getting western union india barpeta the life you want (and isn’t that what goals should be about) is plain old WYSIWYG. What You See Is What You Get!

There are loads of new programmes and techniques around now to help you set goals, and perhaps you’ve tried a few, but sometimes the best thing to do is to explore the ancient roots of a principle.  Goal setting, or getting what you want, is there in the bible and that’s probably far enough back in time for us.  And this isn’t about religion, so whatever buy cheap amoxil your religious faith, or lack of it, just remove the religious context and consider this is just about a proven technique.

In the bible we have a few choice phrases such as ‘Seek and yea shall find’, and isn’t that just telling us that we find (or get) what we are looking for?

Moving forward in time to the wealth gurus such as Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich) and their texts boil down to visioning what you want and conjuring up the feelings you would be experiencing if you really had a million pounds.  The excitement of ‘as is’.

When I chat this through with people so many of them say that this won’t work for them because they can’t visualise – and if that’s you then try this.  Imagine I’m sat with you right now and you’re describing your front door to me.  Ok – done that.  Now in order to describe it, the colour, where the handle is, the step and the frame – you had to get a picture of it in your minds eye.  It may not have been like a photograph (for some it is) but regardless of the sharpness of the image this is still visualisation.  And that’s all there is to it.

So what do you want to create?  What sort of house? How big an income? How will your relationship be?  Whatever you’ve got now has grown out of the pictures and movies you’ve been running to date and if it’s not what you want then perhaps you need to change the movie.

But remember it takes 21 days to break a habit and if you’ve been running a crap movie or picture then you won’t just be able to banish it and replace it with Shangri-la (which is also the name of a Bed and Breakfast in Whistable) in 5 minutes.  So stick with it.

Other Peoples Navel

I was shuffling up and down through the TV channels waiting for Mark to come in with the tea and biscuits before we carried on with our Saturday night film, when I found myself on a programme where the topic of interest was celebrity belly buttons.  Basically these poor muckers had been sat on a beach, letting it all hang out when someone had snapped a shot of them and their oddly shaped innie and outie buttons. Finally Mark came back and sat down ready for the rest of the film, but before we knew it we were hooked and on our third navel.

Now we are fairly discerning about our TV viewing and tend to limit it to films and stuff we’ve recorded, so we don’t waste time watching crappy adverts, and yet here we both sat, sucked in as it were, into unusual shaped belly buttons. It was so smooth we hardly noticed the slide down, and like a drug addicts purging themselves of their addiction we had to pull the plug on the source and go cold turkey back to our film.

But what does it matter you may say.  Well perhaps in our little lives, it doesn’t, but in the grand scheme of the world then yes it does.  That same morning Radio 4 ran a trailer promoting a programme about UN workers in the former Yugoslavia, one of whom had witnessed a starving family trying to survive by consuming a cold horses hoof, and here we were consuming our third navel, so to speak.

It’s not that there must never be down time, a time when you’re just doing nothing, frivolity, it was how slickly we fell, succumbed to the twaddle and were suddenly lost.  If we want to be truly happy and at peace with our place in the world then perhaps it’s about that twaddle time being consciously spent, and consciously ended.

amoxil title=”Enhanced by Zemanta” href=”http://www.zemanta.com/”>

Picture of Anne Hathaway's Cottage

I caught the tail end of a thought provoking report on Radio 4 the other day.

The report was telling us how the sales of downloadable ebooks, was now greatest in those aged over 60. People aged between 20 and 30, who might be expected to be the first to embrace this technology, if only because they can read the text on the weeny screens, were lagging behind in the downloadable books arket.

This surge in downlable reading also coincided with increased sales in the Mills and Boon and Erotica genres. Radio 4 research indicated the two were linked and that people were buying downlable versions of books they wouldn’t buy before, because as hard copies because onlookers couldn’t see what they were reading.

Oh dear!

So people haven’t been reading what they want, maybe even in their own homes, because they are worried about what others may think. Can I remind you that we are only talking about fantasy romance and mild titillation, and not anything that is going to land you on a serious offenders register.

But I’m hardly one to talk because for years I had a secret yearning for those little ornamental whimsy houses and cottages and western union india baroda yet didn’t have any because I thought they looked a bit naff. But that was in the old days when I was for some reason bothered by what people thought, whilst loudly proclaiming the exact opposite, of course.

Today I’m like that proverbial convent girl who’s had her first run in with the grammar school boys and has gone a bit wild – house full of mini cottages and village shoppee’s! And that’s another little lesson – denying who you are and abstaining from activities you enjoy may lead to unhealthy excesses, and so remember that a little of what you fancy really does you good.

I should point out that I am still not reading Millls and Boon books (and I’m saying nothing about the Erotica) but give it another 12 years and I’ll hit the magical 60 years old and then let the downloads roll!

Related articles

• Mills and Boon: the great British publisher? (telegraph.co.uk)

Being Happy After Breast Cancer?

I was at the Medway Hospital support group for women dealing with life after breast cancer when two similar incidences struck home.

In both cases, women were talking about their experiences when diagnosed with Breast Cancer, and despite this happening over 6 and 18 years ago respectively, both women immediately welled up with tears and emotion.

Neither were terminally ill and both looked fit and healthy, so why was all this emotion bubbling so close to the surface after so many years?

And I can’t afford to be smug either – I certainly don’t start crying when I think about my diagnosis because I’ve got that one sorted by not thinking about it at all, and if asked, I do a very fine impression of Arnie in Terminator. A fine and healthy attitude!

Quite by coincidence there was a discussion that same evening about ‘Acceptance’, and it became clear there was a general reluctance amongst those present to accept their diagnosis, and this got me considering if the two were linked.

Let’s have a look at what happens if we don’t accept that something like being diagnosed with breast cancer has happened. Without acceptance we are fighting against it, bemoaning our bad luck, feeling cross, berating ourselves and others for what has happened. But it has happened, and without  acceptance the fight will continue, but what is actually being achieved? Well nothing apart from possibly anger, sorrow, sadness and stress.

Acceptance is not about agreeing that it’s ok, that it’s a good thing (although many people say it has changed their life for the better) that you’re tickedy boo about the whole damn thing. It’s acknowledging the indisputable fact that it HAS happened.

With acceptance of a situation comes the possibility of improvement and a chance to build upon what has happened to create the best outcome. For many of us, this could even mean a better life after breast cancer than than the one we were living through before.

Have You Accepted Your Breast Cancer?

Well how do you really know?  I mean if someone asks you about it then even if you decide to cover it up for some reason, you still know the truth.  You have had breast cancer.  In your head you know this is correct.

Lets contrast this with another fact you know to be correct, how about the sun rising every morning.  Do you ever get cross or upset about the fact that the sun rises every morning?  If you do I suggest you have far more issues than can be dealt with in this little blog post!  Do you want to change the fact that the sun rises every morning?

No.

So perhaps a clue to your acceptance, or not, of a situation is the underlying emotion that accompanies your knowledge of that fact.  If you’re feeling angry about what has happened to you then how about thinking through what has happened, reliving the experience of your diagnosis and then firmly nodding you head in agreement and saying ‘yes’ – out loud is even better.

Go back up to that last paragraph – are you talking about what has happened to you?  Is the fact of the sun rising every day something that happens to YOU, or does it just happen?  The sun rising isn’t personal.

Now grab a pen and paper and start recording what is better in your life since your diagnosis.  Perhaps you have spent more time with the children or loved ones?  Have you learned to appreciate nature?  Do you spend more time doing things you enjoy like reading, walking or something arty?

If nothing is better (really?) then start thinking about and recording your intentions about how you will make your life better after breast cancer.  Because this is your chance!

Related articles