Childlike Wonder

This model used by Stephen R Covey in the 8th Habit demonstrates the relationship between all aspects of our life. That is each one of the elements impacts the other. So far in this blog this month I've shared my suggestions on how changes to your mind and body can significantly impact your life. This week I want to touch on the impact our Heart and our emotions can have. There's lots I could say but I was hoping I'd find a story from life to share and only got that last night!

Talk on the Chris Evans show of the new Chitty Chitty Bang Bang stories took me back to when I saw the musical. I just love musicals and when Chitty flew into the auditorium I'm not sure there was a child in the theater who had a smile wider than me :-). Which had me reminiscing about the Mary Poppins musical and the fabulous dancing to supercalifragilisticexpialidocious - or rather to suoicodilaipxecitsiligarfilacrepus. And then what about when Bert tap dances his way up the side and along the top of the stage curtains! Which meant last night there I was listening, and yes even dancing and singing, along to some of my favourite songs from musicals (you might want to turn your sound down little before using any of the links):

Seasons of Love from Rent - how do you measure a year?

Defying Gravity from Wicked - I still get goosebumps

Circle of Life from Lion King - what about those costumes?

Which had me remembering other acts that have amazed and inspired me:
Cirque du Soleil - La Nouba - the trampoline sequence just has to be seen

and finally I moved onto my other sing along at the top of my voice songs including:
Affirmation from Savage Garden

It's easy to buy into the current situation and believe it's that that's making us feel as we are - especially when it's not as we'd like it to be. We're upset because X did or said Y to us. The reality is we have a choice how we react and sometimes when life is getting us down we simple need to find that child like wonder to get that spring back into our step.

What would bring some child like wonder into your life this weekend?

Alison

PS I've so loved revisiting these again this morning and hope you all have a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious weekend.

Loving what you do isn't enough

I was listening to Aled Jones talking to Katie Melua this morning and she mentioned having to cancel her last tour due to ill health. She said it had come as as shock because she so loved what she did and thought that was enough. Aled then commented that when on tour himself he's constantly reminded by others not to live on junk foods.

We don't have to look far in the media to be reminded "we are what we eat". Or the benefits of cutting down on alcohol, caffeine, refined sugar and processed foods. The difficulty, for me anyway, has been taking that information and making it meaningful enough to act as a motivator to make different choices. At some level we all know that too much of all these foods can have a negative impact on our health, weight, mind, energy, vitality, well being and yes even longevity. Yet many of us keep eating too many of these - or is it just me?

As someone who is very sensitive to the impact of caffeine and alcohol it's not been difficult to cut them out (although I may have something to drink at the CIPS dinner of Thursday). However living on my own and working as I do has always meant I find it easy to skip meals and/or choose ready meals and also reach for the sweets mid afternoon to give me that extra oomph to get through the rest of the day.

3 weeks ago I went on a food4life workshop that seems to have provided the motivation to start to make healthier choices. I'm sure much of what went on over the 3 days contributed to the change in mindset but 2 statements come to mind and, so far, have stopped me making choices that include ready meals, refined sugars and processed foods. These statements are:

* Food is medicine
* Our body doesn't recognise processed foods and doesn't know what to do with them!

I'm not suggesting that these statements will miraculously change your actions. However if life isn't as you want it I'd strongly encourage you to find your own motivators to making healthier choices because they will ultimately make a big difference in ways I'm not sure we can always expect.

Please do share what motivates you to make healthier choices - you never know it just may make a difference for someone?

Alison Smith
Helping purchasing relationships remain healthy

This week I'm moving onto our Body's contribution to well being and our ability to have the life we want and get things done. Last week my blog touched on the Mind's contribution.

What do you get on your soap box about?

A small thing but the cashier in M&S commented on how much she also liked a juice I was buying today. I realised in that moment the difference it makes being sold something by someone who has passion for the product.

I have repeatedly told clients that they should ensure the work they do involves something they enjoy, are good at and have passion for. In this context passion isn't just about liking the product or service but being passionate about the difference it makes and being even more passionate about why the difference matters. I usually ask "what do you get on your soap box about?"

The other week I realised whilst I'm good and enjoy helping people get on track and truly believe we should all get out of bed with enthusiasm for the day ahead I don't get on my soap box if you don't.

So I wondered what I did get on my soap box about - of course others could tell me - purchasing and business behaviours! After all I've worked in business within Purchasing/Procurement since I left uni! More and more I can be repeatedly heard saying we need more authenticity, integrity, trust and honesty in business. Because this truly does connect with my passion this purpose provides the motivation every day to want to make a difference.

So having had a dual personality for the last four years and having spent energy trying to keep my 2 halves (Purchasing and Personal development) separate I realise it's time to be authentic in all that I do and bring the two together. So from now on I will be concentrating my efforts on Transforming Purchasing Relationships - those with yourself, as a team and with suppliers.

I'm sure my observations in blogs will continue but I'll be as interested as you to see how they change now I'm no longer schizophrenic!

What do you get on your soap box about? And how can this inspire you every day to make the changes you want to see in the world?

Alison
Helping purchasing relationships find and live their passion

Lay back and think of England!

From conversations recently I think that's how many of us are approaching life.

Before you disagree could you please just do an inventory of all areas of your life and confirm how many of them you're perfectly happy with.

Work?
Relationship?
Family?
Friends?
Health?
Fitness?
Home?
Hobbies?
Contribution?

How did you get on?

What I've noticed is we do really seem to put up with a lot of what should be unacceptable in our lives. We just say "That's life", "That's business", "That's relationships for you", "That's just the way it is" or even "That's old age for you."

I had a conversation a few weeks ago with someone who was putting their physical and emotional symptoms down to old age. The problem with that is old age doesn't go away and yet the symptoms could. I remember the new lease of life my dad got when at the age of 75 he got his first PC, or how much happier a friend was when she changed her eating habits, or another friend took up a hobby.

Please don't just lay back and think of England and put up with a life that's not making you happy. Identify the symptoms and then explore the opportunities to getting to the other side. There are always many more opportunities than you think.

and that's me now off on holiday for a PC free week - wooop woop

Helping you find passion in life

Alison
alison@alisonsmith.eu 07770 538159
www.alisonsmith.eu

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?

PASSION in Business

I realised I talked a lot about business values and hadn't written any myself so I rectified that the other week. Imagine my surprise when they started to spell the word PASSION and even more when I realised the first value would be profitability!!

PASSION - without passion where would a business be!

Profitability - a reminder for me that we wont be able to keep doing what we're doing unless the work we do is profitable. Others may not need reminding but I do otherwise I'll keep forgetting to value (ie charge for) the service we provide. I love that it ended up being first on the list. We'll also apply this value when dealing with suppliers and other partners.

Authenticity - about saying "No" not "Yes" if that's the right thing to do and searching for those who we can easily say yes to because they accept us for who we are.

Sustainability - ensuring actions allow for the sustainability of our business, others' businesses and the planet.

Service - remembering why we do what we do ie to make a difference in others' lives by getting them back on track and connected to what gives them passion every day.

Intuition - not all business decisions will come with logic and lots of supportive data.

Openness - being honest sharing who we are and our journey and walking our talk even if we don't always find it easy.

Nurture -nurturing others so they may develop and grow and be the change they want to see in the world.

I'll let you know how we get on.

Inspiration to make a difference in the world in under 3 words

Pathfinder, Simplicity in Crisis, Unlocking Profit, Making Genuine Connections and Light in the Dark (ok that's 4 words) have all been recent examples of missions identified in recent sessions with people.

The discussions arose whilst exploring the seven steps out of the creek. Many realised they had got as far as Mission and got stuck!! There seemed to be so many things they could be doing and therefore lots of potential customers. However they didn't seem to be quite generating the attraction they needed or weren't quite enjoying their work as much as they knew they could.

Ever since starting working for myself I've been told to find my niche. The desire not to restrict potential customers has meant I'd ignored doing that. Until I realised that I could have more passion every day if I stuck to what I was really really good at than trying to do things I was just good at. Of course I'd also be doing what provided the most value to my clients too.

To get the answers above we just explored what we were really really good at (and enjoyed and had passion for) - and more importantly what benefit/value it delivered to our customers. The hard part was then identifying 2/3 words to describe the work that inspired us. We could look at what words we'd use with clients later - our mission is something we can connect with that provides daily inspiration and a reminder why we do what we do and how we can make the biggest difference in the world.

Simply STOP what you're doing

In the book I've written Stop is the first step out of the creek and getting back on track. The more I work with people and talk on the subject the more important I realise Stopping is when doing anything in life.

It's easy to understand metaphorically when we're up the creek that stopping would be useful. It's easy to understand that to not continue to move up the creek any further might be useful. It's easy to understand that stopping might provide time to assess the situation and understand what direction to take in the future. It's also easy to understand that going around like a headless chicken isn't helping. It just doesn't seem so easy to do it and STOP. It's as if the one thing that would help - ie stopping is the one thing we're unable or unwilling to do.

What I realise is stopping is important at any new turn in the river not just when we're up the creek. That is before committing to taking a particular course in the river stop and reflect on what's driving the decision and understand how it aligns with your passion and purpose in life. It's only then that you can ensure you start to avoid the creeks in life.

What would make you proud to have named after you?

Interesting how things happen. Dr Who names a galaxy Alison. I ask a question in LinkedIn about what would make you the proudest to have named after you (not a person). And the responses provide me with the perfect question for my workshops when discussing step 3 of a process I've developed called Mission! (see link)

The last blog will have given you a sense of the 7 steps I've developed to help you get out of the creek or take action to avoid going down it in the first place. After stopping and putting on your life jacket the third step is about using what you enjoy, are good and have passion for, along with connecting to your values, to identify your mission or purpose for your life. In other words what will get you out of bed in the morning with enthusiasm? (This was discussed in my contribution to How not to be like your parents - again see links on rhs.)

I've tried many different questions to get to the heart of the matter and so have others - what's your legacy, what would your eulogy say, what difference would you most like to make in the world etc etc. The question 'what would make you proudest to have named after you' seemed to hit the mark. The answers have been truly inspiring:

Those things being named included: schools, colours, streets, institutions, libraries, rooms, processes, methods, cures, vaccines, parks, funds, charities, awards, hospitals, ways of living, roses and butterflies.

It was the why these would be named after them that seemed to tap into their mission - the difference they wanted to make in life.

What would make you proudest? and why? and what can you do today to start to make it a reality? You may not get the library named after you but you will have made a difference.