Life Success Habits

Have you noticed how some people just seem to have power exuding from them, whilst others follow the power rather than possess it. Why is that? I was just reflecting on self power after a recent incident in my own career where I turned down a consulting engagement because my last experience with this particular client was the only stressful experience of my working career. I promised myself at the time that i would never subject myself to that again.

After 18 months, they asked if i would once again help them with some strategic work. At first I considered it, but then during the discussions I realised warning bells that sounded far too familiar. It’s not always easy to turn away work, but turning this one down was far more satisfying that any financial recompense could provide. I realised that I was also feeling something else – power. Not the arrogant maniacal power, but a deep inner self power. It made me realise that in the previous situation I gave my power away, and in doing so lost control of the outcome. Not so this time. I was prepared to accept the outcome and had the power to say yes or no. And in doing so it felt fantastic.

We are all born with power – during our lives we make constant choices as to whether keep it or give it away. Its like a bank account – when we do empowering things – perform well with our work, make good decisions, lead with compassion, we are topping up our power account. When we let others undervalue us, mislead us in our negotiations, fail to deliver to a promise, we draw down on that account. Its so easy in life as we try to please those around us to keep making withdrawals and not topping up.

I have had a year of massive change in my life – and many of the secure elements of my life from which I drew self power were cut away. After a year of rebuilding my life, I feel more self power than I have in years. And this time, I am going to keep my account in a much healthier state.

I had a set back this morning – in the big scheme of things it is only minor. Simply another $1200 for no real gain, but a necessary evil. Yet for some reason it has gutted me – it frustrates me. Why? Is it because it reinforces a self-sabotaging perspective that everything I do is a struggle. Even when it shouldn’t be. Is it really that EVERYTHING is a struggle, or does it just seem that way? Am I giving too much weight to the things that don’t go smoothly, and not enough focus on those which do? Am I simply attracting more struggle because I sort of now expect it.

I decided to ‘get out of state’ by going for a quick walk and planning how I was going to overcome another struggle I am having with formatting some Kindle ebooks – it seems that Amazon is doing everything it can to incorporate all the whizz bang multi media elements into Kindle books, but one cannot simply format up headings and lists in a way that is pleasing to the eye. This is not uncommon in the world of technology – everybody wants to provide the super smart features at the expense of the basics. So I have had to pull back my desire to give the reader a thoroughly pleasant reading experience and give them unformatted bullet lists and headings that cannot be linked to via the device controls. Hardly an ideal product but one that Amazon had unfortunately deemed acceptable.

During my walk I decided to come back to my office and invest 2 hours in attempting to get at least one Kindle book published to a reasonable standard. Yet, I got back here with my gut in a knot, not wanting to take on another problem for the day that was going to deliver a less than satisfying outcome. So I decided to play one game of FreeCell. During the game, I realised that things were not going to work out and had to back out of a few steps and try again. It struck me that I could calmly [and even enjoyably] tolerate the struggle and multiple attempts during a game, yet for work purposes I would feel anxious and tend towards procrastination.

How could I approach these tasks in the same way I do my game. After all, I have agreed with myself that I will surrender and let life happen through me and not to me as outlined in my previous post. Just saying it allowed all the anxiety to drop away. I reframed my 2 hour tasks as an ‘attempt’ to resolve the Kindle issue, rather than expect any outcome. This may sound like I am accepting failure – but for me at the moment, failure is not trying. By giving it an honest attempt to get a good outcome in two hours I am succeeding by overcoming my anxiety and my procrastination and learning to attack problems with a different focus. I am gamifying the task. It’s all a matter of perception and finding a state where the energy flows.

Wish me luck !

Life is like a pair of shoes. We chose a life style that seems appropriate at the time – we wear it well – but often fail to notice when the style no longer serves us.  Just as we wouldn’t expect a child to continue wearing a pair of shoes they have outgrown, that no longer suit them, we must also update our shoes.

Our shoes serve a useful purpose – so does our life style. However, it seems much easier to recognize when it is time to discard a pair of shoes, when they no longer serve us, when they are too small or looking too shabby, than it is to discard a chosen style of living when it no longer serves us.

We need to be aware that we need to update our life as often as we update our shoes. When we buy a pair of shoes, we don’t go out seeking to replace the exact same pair – we seek to improve the quality, the style, the comfort. To continue to grow as a person we must do the same with our lives. If we keep wearing the same tired life, it gets outdated – we may not notice but everyone else sure does.

Don’t keep wearing the same outdated life – think about how you have grown, and continually update your life to better suit the person you are today.

If you continue to stay the same you are not only a sorry old pair of shoes – you are are a sorry outdated person.

Give yourself permission to grow – give yourself space to grow. Just like you update your childrens shoes as they grow.

How you define yourself has a lot to do with your future. Your reality is what you create right now.

We all have challenges, every day. Big challenges are there to strengthen you. How you react to those challenges is how you define yourself. The decisions you make at those tough times in your life help shape your future.

 Dont look at what is in front of you, look to where you want to be in the future. This helps to change your focus from what you are going through, to what you are going to.

Make this very moment, your finest hour….remember, you will never have this hour again. If you normally react to the challenge you have right this hour in a non-productive way, then this is your biggest chance in your life so far to change that.

It doesn’t matter what you have or have not done in the past, or what mistakes have brought grief into your life in the past….you can change it all now with one moment in time. By making a better decision you, you forever change the path of your life, if for no other reason as you will now have a new opinion of yourself. And that new truth about yourself will propel you into new habits, that will continue to strengthen everytime you make this new better choice – until it becomes your new habit, your new way of acting, your new and more successful you.