The end of your world could be upon you!

The end of your world could be upon you.... and I don't mean 21st December 2012 I mean today, tomorrow or if you're lucky some future date many days from today - but it will come.

Why?

Because none of us know how much longer we will be here - and as hard as that sounds it's a fact.
I'd love to start the year as I normally do with plenty of tips on goal setting and how to keep on track (and I promise they will come). However they will be very much future orientated and some of us many not be here to reap the rewards. That is:

• We eat well or exercise today in order to be healthy tomorrow


• We work hard in order to get some result in the future


• We learn so that we may apply it next week


• and we procrastinate plenty and put things off until another day (or is that just me?)

The picture above is one of the daily photo's I sent a friend from August 26th last year shortly after her prognosis until she went into the hospice late in November before dying peacefully in her sleep on 28th December - 4 months later. Each picture was my invitation to her to remember to:

• Stay in the moment


• Enjoy each day


• Remember she was loved


• Speak from the heart


• Leave nothing unsaid


• Find gratitude in the small things


• Laugh


• Remember and appreciate the good times

That is to believe in tomorrow but live for today.

I'm not suggesting we stop setting goals, exercising or eating healthily. What I am suggesting is we find some time each day to really live for today - because we really don't know how many more of them we may have. I'm sure my friend, and her husband on their holiday abroad in July, were busy imagining a very different Christmas and New Year with their family to the one that enfolded. They had many precious moments between August 26th and December 28th but many of those were because they knew the end of her world was near.

It's easy to act is if it's never going to happen - this blog is a reminder that it will - don't let those small moments pass YOU by.

In loving memory of a friend who will be sadly missed x

Your habits are contagious - so are theirs

It's often been said if you want to be wealthy to hang around with the wealthy and certainly stop spending time with those who aren't. Having spent a day with Dr David Hamilton at the weekend I realise that’s also true for all our:

Habits – health, relationships, team working, communication, performance
Emotions – happiness, fear, anger, depression
And yes even yawns!

That is these are all catching – we can get infected by others and of course we do our fair share of infecting too. So if you have goals you want to achieve you’d best check that the habits and emotions of those around you, up to 3 degrees of separation, would be useful to you. Although the closer you are to someone the more likely you are to get infected!

David has just released his new book ‘The contagious power of thinking’. The main premise of the book, supported by lots of research and science, is that we’re hard wired to copy others! The mirror neurons in our brain pick up on what others are doing and want to copy them. So if someone smiles at you your mirror neurons will subtly copy that smile and there’s very little you can do about it. Just as there’re very little you can do when someone passes a frown, anger of fear your way – not instantly anyway.
This can have a significant impact in organisations as one study published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology showed where for each one point increase in a retail manager’s job satisfaction there was 5 percent increase in customer spending. Other studies including from Harvard support the findings about the ‘contagious power of thinking’.
Who are you infecting and is it helping?

What's on your To Be list?

I'm preparing for my 'Pots of Confidence' workshop tonight. Most of the evening will be taken up decorating a mug or plate with words, pictures or designs to inspire - such as the one shown here.

My house is full of such inspiration - postcards, pictures, quotes on every surface. Someone visited last week and couldn't believe I had my mission and values pinned up in my bathroom :-).

I was wondering why doing this was important and why it worked. Then I realised we do it every day for our To Do lists. That is we write a list and check it regularly. We even write reminders for ourselves on post its. So why not do it for our To Be lists?

If I look around my office at my To Be lists then I am reminded to: Love, have Patience, Be the change I wish to see in the world, Joy, Awaken, Boldly reclaim my power and even to Grow wings and fly. They're accompanied by many of my brother's beautiful landscape photographs.

What's on your To Be list and where will you put the reminder?

Love and Acceptance

Please find below highlights and insights from a solo Transformation Game with the intention 'I intend to love and accept myself exactly as I am'. Further details of the process used can be found in the 'Transformation Game' article found on the list of articles on the RHS of this screen.

Please note the Transformation Game is used with a personal rather than business audience. Some of the language and examples used therefore are more appropriate for a personal audience - I have however chosen not to translate nor amend the notes here. Instead I invite you to simply amend any words or ignore any examples that get in the way of your learning and any insight taking place.

I have used a game played on behalf of a character from my forthcoming book and facilitated by her coach. Anne is 35 and got divorced three years ago. Whilst everyone else thinks she's doing well she's constantly tired and certainly isn't as happy as everyone expects her to be.

For Anne the challenge with loving herself exactly as she is has been the constant need for development and belief that there's a perfect state of being that she needs to attain. Which meant she realised that she would only love herself when she achieves that state of perfection and not before!

What about you? Before reading further you may wish to spend some time considering your own relationship with the intention. Do you love and accept yourself exactly as you are? If not are there certain times or certain people who help you to do this and others who hinder? How would life be different if you did? With that in mind please consider your reaction to the following cards, and where helpful Anne's interpretation (Playing a game, whether on your own, with others, facilitated or not would of course add a depth of exploration we've not been able to share here):

Angel: of Delight :-).
For Anne this was a reminder to enjoy the journey of life not make it about continual improvement. Which of recent times seems to have reinforced a belief in the lack of perfection rather than see the perfection in simply being.

Insight: You are able to point out a friends lack of awareness without appearing judgmental or making them feel inadequate or inferior.
Which prompted her coach to ask Anne if she can do this with others why not herself? A reminder that she wasn't inadequate nor inferior even if she had things she wanted to change.

Setback: You are setback by your infatuation.
The dictionary describes infatuation as 'a foolish or exaggerated passion'. They wondered in this context whether that meant that passion for perfection is foolish? Of course the key is understanding how that sets us back and for Anne it was the procrastination that comes from not doing things until she's got better or reached perfection! As Anne remembered a time when she did this then she realised it's also taking a lot to energy to hold herself back from doing all those things she wants to do in the world. No wonder she was tired!

(If you're exploring your own relationship to the cards you may want to identify and fully describe a time when you were set back infatuation too. This is the case for all setbacks as connecting with the pain involved may help release the setback.)

Angel: of Purification.
For Anne connecting to this energy felt like a release of all the beliefs that she had that had kept her infatuated with perfection. "A bit like turning off the PC and turning it on again when we've tried everything else to resolve a problem!" she said.

Insight: You meet the needs of others as though they were your own.
When Anne thought about doing this, because her focus was on being of service to the other person, she forgot about the unhelpful beliefs and just accepted that who she was enough.

Setback: You are set back by your resentment.
Yes resentment of all those people who Anne thought had achieved perfection and who she'd put up on a pedestal! The real setback was resentment took up time and energy and resulted in lack of focus on what she wanted to be doing. So a reminder to start taking the initiative and also be grateful and appreciative when she saw people clearly doing what she knew she wanted and could do.

Insight: You stepped out and crossed over the line beyond your dreams, beyond your drama and into the truth of life.
Anne loved this card. She said "It's such a great reminder to just blinking get on with it and stop faffing about!". Life could be so much more than it is and Anne realised it was only herself stopping her doing that!

Setback: "I'm not willing to put myself out there unless I'm 100% sure"
A GREAT reminder that this belief still has the capacity to stop us in our tracks! That stepping out beyond our drama means putting ourselves out there NOW.

(What about you? what could you do today to put yourself out there? Whilst reading our interpretations might be useful finding your own relationship with the cards will help you understand any actions you could be taking.)

Insight: Tough assignments are only given to the best students.
:-) - A reminder Anne could handle it.

Setback: You are set back by your defensiveness.
Anne got very defensive when discussing this card. As she connected with the feeling of defensiveness she realised she stopped listening, started defending and justifying and just dug herself into a big hole. A hole that took some time to get out of once the reason for the defences had gone. Not that helpful really she realised.

(What are you being defensive about?)

Setback: You are set back by your attachment.
Anne realised she was attached to 'developing' and that attachment was driving a lot of behaviours which were getting in the way of being in the moment and enjoying the journey. Which continued from the last setback on not listening and added: not noticing, not enjoying, not exploring, not laughing, not.. not... not... mmm which sort of defeats the object she realised!

Which Anne summarised when she said "I'm making it much too much hard work and I need to get into that energy of Delight, Transformation and Magic that I talk about often not this constant not being enough anal gazing!"

Insight: I love and accept myself exactly as I am.
They did laugh when this card emerged as it seemed to be suggesting Anne was nearly there even if she still had one more insight to go. The 5 awareness tokens (rather than 3 for most insights) that came with the card were a reminder of the benefit to be gained from truly embracing this affirmation. Anne started to understand how life would be different as a result and how happiness was in the moment not something to be found when certain criteria where achieved.

Anne's last card was
Insight: I forgive everyone, I forgive myself, I forgive all past experience. I am free!
Which seemed to be about forgiving herself for the past and fully connecting with the angel of delight!

(What about you? How do you relate differently to the affirmation ' I love and accept myself exactly as I am'? What actions have you identified as you read these notes - when will you take them? Do you need to share them with anyone to ensure they get done?)

The process, insight, setback and angel cards used here are from the Transformation Game copyright Innerlinks http://www.innerlinks.com/.

The Transformation Game can be purchased from Amazon and Findhorn. Facilitated games are available worldwide and games for 1-12 people are currently available in Scotland with the author and other UK locations and worldwide if you want me there in the future.