The 100 Day Challenge, Day 4:

This going to be a short blog today, as it is late here- at least for me to be writing and making some sense!  What stands out for me today, that I would like to share with you is this:

NEVER underestimate how much a kind word, compliment, thank you, or encouraging feedback can mean to someone.

When you share one of these with someone, you make them feel great, and you feel that from them and then you feel great, too.  It is a gift.

Even if you never know for sure what happens next, be assured that the possibility of more magical things happening in that person’s life whom you blessed with your good word has greatly expanded.  And the chances are pretty good that they are going to pass on that great energy and kindness to someone else.  Endless people benefit, all because of you.  Pretty cool, huh?

Who will you bless tomorrow with your good word?

The 100 Day Challenge, Day 3:

I think personal development has gotten a bad wrap.  Sometimes mixed up with self-help (which is not the same thing), maybe people don’t like the word help?  I think self- improvement could be another way of saying personal development-  I think it’s great and here’s why!  I met with someone today who is so excited about personal development- she enjoy incorporating it into her daily life and now has a business helping other people get access to great thinking, books, cd’s, etc- everything to help them on their personal development journey.  She had the glow!  So what is this about really?  It is about your mind getting excited about something, it is about your mind growing and expanding because you are engaged in learning something new.

There are no rules in my book- your personal development is just that, personal.  What do you want to learn more about?  What skills or knowledge would you like to pick up?  What new habits would benefit you in the way of living a more fun , joyful and prosperous life?  What habits would you like to kick to the curb because they are doing just the opposite?  All of these are personal development.

People get stuck on thinking that personal development is only about motivation and success-two areas I love to learn and expand in- and some think it is just about learning about how to be happy- another area I love to study!- but really it is up to you.  The bottom line is the constant involvement in personal development for yourself will lead to more energy and increased fun and joy in your life.  There is a glow that you will pick up- much like the person I was lucky to spend time with today- that makes people want to find out what you are up to!  Being engaged in learning and improving in any area of your life, will benefit other areas of your life in some surprising and wonderful ways.

Are you picking up on a theme in these 100 day challenge posts?  If you choose to read this blog for the next 100 days and you choose to take some of the information and take action on it, my intent is that you have more energy, joy and fun happening in your life- in all areas!

Today’s challenge:  Make your own personal development plan for the year- is there one thing you want to work on/learn or multiple things?  Plan out how you will do this in writing and start on the first one this weekend!  And most of all- have fun!!  Catch that glow!!

100 Day Challenge, Day 2:

“Without clarity, there is no prosperity.  Clearing away the rubble makes for clear thoughts.”  Julia Cameron from her new book the Prosperous Heart.

Not a week goes by that at least one client or attendee at one of my classes or speaking engagements doesn’t challenge me on this point:  clearing away clutter makes room for more energy- positive energy.  It makes room for new thoughts, breathing freer, and peace of mind.  “But I know where everything is!”, is the standard answer I get.  While that may actually be true, though I do question that, they are still underestimating the cost of a messy office, home, car.  You can not put a price on the energy that mess sucks right out of you- the sky’s the limit on what good that lost energy could be/could have been doing in your life.

Thankfully, I am happy to say that I am usually able to convince the non-believers into giving it a shot and have been honored to see the results this experiment delivers to them.  “I love how I feel each morning when I walk into my clean and organized office!”, one client said recently “I feel I can start my day with purpose, and even though I “knew” where everything was before, now I could find it much more quickly.  I am wasting a lot less time.”

Clearing clutter and picking up mess is moving forward and takes on energy of it’s own.  You will see that you feel differently when things are clean around you.  You will start to get more done.

If having more prosperity in your life- in any area of your life- is something that is important to you, make a plan to clean something up this weekend.  Julia Cameron suggests doing this in 15 minute increments.  You could call it laser cleaning!  Take one area at a time.  Write down your plan.  Your living areas, your bedroom, your closet, the basement, your office, your garage, closets, and your car are all targets.  Pick one area, write it into your schedule WHEN you will do it and go for it.  Clutter is stealing your prosperity, clarity, creativity and peace of mind.  Isn’t now a great time to get it all back?

I do, by the way recommend The Prosperous Heart, by Julia Cameron- what I am enjoying most is that she really helps you to see all of the ways prosperity can and does show up in your life.  It’s not just about money.

100 Day Challenge, Day 1:

Here we go again!  About 1 1/2 years ago I did a 100 day blogging challenge- blogging each day for 100 days in a row.  Today begins round 2!  I am happy to say that I have company in this challenge this time around, which will make it even more fun.

The last time some very good things came out of my challenge- I learned to censor myself less, I learned to deal with the criticism of people regarding my spelling and punctuation- sometimes I would be doing these posts at 11 at night while my head was nodding- and I learned that I could right a short post that offered value.  Now, I have really fallen off the blogging band wagon- writing sporadically at best.  This is the perfect time to build momentum for a great year ahead.

Today is February 1st and the challenge will end on May 10th.  What one thing could you do every day for the next 100 days that would offer you a big break through in some area of your life?  You could take on a small daily activity that will compound into a large and impactful result.  If you can, find someone to join you, or to at least hold you accountable.  The more people that know, the better.  I will be posting each of these on Facebook, so a lot of people will know.

If you are up for a 100 Day Challenge- post something and share what yours is!  Here’s to a fabulous February and to the start of an exciting new adventure!

The month end,  though seemingly so far away on the first of the month, seems to sneak up right up! How often do we hear- where did the month go? I notice that the more on purpose a person is, the less I hear this from them. Considering all of this,   I was just putting together a few thoughts to end a month on a strong note, and thought I would share them here.

To start with,  give your goals for the month a good strong look- what do you still want to accomplish?- ask yourself:  If I only completed one thing in the last few days of the month, what would make the most positive impact on my life and/or my business?  Make a plan to do that one thing- write it out, and plan the time to do it into your calendar.

Review and make a list of all of the things you did accomplish this month.  Recognizing the good in what you have done will give you great energy to work on the rest.

Look at what is still left undone.   Are these things still important?   If not, drop them from your plan.  If they are still important ask yourself:   What stopped your from getting them done this month?  How can you get past those obstacles as you move forward into the next month?

What are your aha’s for the month?  Darren Hardy (www.thecompoundeffect.com) talks about reflecting on your aha’s as a way to learn from your actions, lack of actions, successes and failures in a positive way.  This is not a beat yourself up session.  Reflection is necessary in order to correct course if needed, to figure out new approaches, and to allow you to build on what is already working.

I would encourage everyone to carve out even an hour per week in a designated place- John Maxwell gave me the idea of having a thinking chair, so I have one and this is where I go- to just think, review your goals, create new plans, thoughts, ideas.  It will be one of the greatest and most important gifts you will give to yourself.  You will see how you start to reach your goals at a higher level when you get this habit in place.  Beware, it is addicting, though, and you may find yourself wanting to spend an hour a day in your thinking chair- or location of choice!

Me sitting in John Maxwell's thinking chair- Palm Beach, FL, August 2011

How will you finish the month strong?  Have fun thinking about it!  AND then take action to make it happen!

This year is off to a fun, challenge filled and energizing start. Everywhere I go I am experiencing people who are up to big things in 2012! People are doing things they have only ever thought of doing and are collaborating and teaming up with new and different groups which is bringing about a whole new level of ideas. Recently when having coffee with a real go getter I agreed to another challenge. I told her the story of my 100 day blogging challenge (see archives) and by the end of the story we had agreed to do one together- starting February 1st.

As I looked at our ending date- May 10th- I realized that a ten day April vacation happens along the way. Do I want to blog on vacation? Maybe we can do a 75 day challenge- that’s still great, right? I start to think of the logistics- I have plenty of reasons not to do it. And then I think: think ahead!!

And then I remember my under-utilized iPad! How simple, how easy.

And I think about how inspired and uplifted I feel on vacation and how some quick blog posts might really capture that.

I have never blogged on my iPad, so here I am- it works- what do you know, pretty easy once I remembered my stored password! Thinking ahead, I have now tested it out. Now I know it is easy and can put my unsupportive thoughts aside and just once again get back to thinking about how much fun the challenge will be this time doing it along with someone else.

How many times do we get stuck in what looks not-doable in the moment instead of thinking ahead to how it could actually work? Test it out if you need to. Do what you need to to assure yourself that you can follow through with your commitments. You will always be glad you did.
I have always been taught: prepare prepare prepare!!

How else could the idea of thinking ahead at a higher level serve you in 2012?

My new year is starting out in a really exciting way- I planned it that way!  I made a decision in December about how I wanted the beginning of the new year to look for me and now it is in motion.  One of the things I love most is having the opportunity to appear on the radio and tv to share great thoughts, encouragement and information that can help people to live a more successful, enjoyable, healthy, and just plain wonderful lives- by their definition. 

Being that it was the beginning of a new year, the theme of all of these appearances has been the same- starting a new year right, setting resolutions and how to be successful with them.  This year, I have noticed a lot of focus on reality- that it is easy to start, and harder to keep going, especially for the full year.  Though the appearances have all been a little different, some of the same points have come up over and over again.  I have also heard from many people which points have made the most impact for them.  I want to share those with you in today’s post, in no particular order.

1. You MUST get comfortable with being uncomfortable.  Change brings discomfort, it is just a part of the game- look at the discomfort as a sign that you are on the right track!  Decide to keep going through the discomfort- you will get the reward!  Running into an obstacle or discomfort is the main reason people give up on their goals.

2.  If you get off track, and everyone does, get right back on track again.  You can have a fresh start any day.  Getting off track is no reason to trash you goal.  Don’t beat yourself up, just assess what caused you to get off track so that you can get through it the next time it comes up. 

3.  Get accountabilty.  Going it along is MUCH harder- find someone who has your best interests at heart and wants to see you succeed to hold you accountable to what you said you wanted to do.  It can be a friend, co-worker, child, coach, etc.  Finding like minded people with similar goals to spend time with is extremely helpful!  Ask for help- successful people always have people who have helped them to reach their goals.

4.   Check out www.thecompoundeffect.com and learn about the impact your choices have.  Learn to keep the big picture in mind, your end result and all the good it represents, while placing the high importance every choice you make all day long.  The little choices will be the reason you succeed- or don’t.

5.  Clean up your environments to allow clarity, and to regain a lot of energy you are losing through clutter and disorganization.  Your home, your office, your car and the people you spend time with are all examples of environments you have in your life.

6.  Fill your head with positive, uplifting, motivational, and inspiring “stuff” each day.  Try an experiment for 90 days- give up negative news and read great books instead.  Biographies are a great genre for this- read about people who have overcome obstacles and learn from them.  Listen to inspiring and motivational recordings in the car.  Success magazine is one of my favorite things to suggest as it is filled with great information and contains a cd for the car each month with interviews of great thinkers- expand your mind in 2012.

7.  Laugh!  Keeping your eye on the light side of things, seeking out humor in funny books, radio shows, telling jokes, and watching humorous movies.  Hang around funny friends that make you laugh.  Laughing brings more and better energy and let’s face it, if you are laughing, you are having fun!

8.  Review your (written) goals each morning when you get up and before you go to bed.  Keeping focused on what you want everyday is the key.  Plan your actions for the day based on what you said you wanted- the quality of your choices will determine your outcome.

My best to you for a spectacular and sparkling 2012!  It is going to be a great year!

Willpower- definition:  Control of one’s impulses and actions; self control.

One of my great clients just shared this with me- I don’t have a name to attribute it to, but it really made me think, again, about this subject of willpower that I have conversing with a few others about.

It went like this “You can’t say yes to life, until you say no to yourself.”

OOOOH.  How many times do we set out with a goal, wish, dream, project only to derail OURSELVES?

I have loved the thought for years- give something up now for something better later.  These thoughts are really appealing to me, yet I can see how I  struggle with the execution at times!

Everyone I talk to seems to have their own thoughts about willpower that vary greatly from one to the next.  I have had people tell me there is no such thing, and I have had people swear they live by it as one of their greatest strengths.

I decided to do a little research- both with personal observing in my life, and by consulting a book called, aptly:  Willpower- Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength by Baumeister and Tierney.  Though the book reads a little like a text book, I was able to realize a lot of what I feel are really important thoughts.

Some of the interesting things this book points out are the connection between physiology, blood sugar and the ability to use self control.  They discuss the role PMS plays, and how eating and sleep affects the picture. One of the most important things I read was that your willpower can be strengthened- they even discuss willpower workouts! I like the hopefulness of this!   As I read the book I was struck by the number of thoughts and ideas that caused me to think “aha, now that makes sense why I….”,  “Okay, NOW I understand….”  It truly is eye opening.

A quote from the book : “Willpower enables us to get along with others and override impulses that are based on personal short-term interests.”  Self-control is not selfish.

Personally, I have to mention that all of my thoughts on willpower are my own and that I honor the thoughts of others as their truth.  I feel that willpower is within everyone of us, incubating, waiting.  I feel that you have to have a reason for willpower to surface.  You have to have something that is important to you, bubbling within you, to ignite this strength.  Otherwise there is no reason for it to appear.  Willpower surfaces to help you in times when what you are up to gets hard, boring, obstacles appear or you feel like giving up.It shows up when something in the short term like say, an ice cream sundae or a sale at your favorite store shows up and threatens to steal your focus.

Think of a time that you set you do start and finish a project.  Think about the process you went through to actually make it happen- can you spot the places where your willpower helped you to stay on the path, or to maybe get back on the path to finishing and realizing the result you wanted?  Chances are you have used willpower over and over in your life and have just not recognized it.

Observing willpower(and lack of) in my own life I noticed myself being swayed to do something else that seemed fun in the moment instead of doing my work- thus delaying the result I was looking for by even a week.  I watched an aquaintance who says she is wanting to not eat sweets do just the opposite because something yummy was there in front of her, I noticed another person spending money to buy things he did not need because he was feeling a little down that day.

I also saw my son Joe Joe run and beat me in a 5k race that was harder than any other he had ever done purely because he wanted to beat me- and he did!  I was able to see one of my clients go for a big and difficult goal and because the reason for reaching it was so important to her, no obstacle could shake her focus.  I heard my friend tell how she finished a big project in such a strong way- as she described the energy just kept building as she moved forward- and she knew others were counting on her, too- so she just made it happen.

There are examples everywhere around of- examples of people employing their willpower and those who are not.  Which side do you usually fall on?  Start doing your own personal research, reading and study to see what you can find out about yourself.  If you want to, you can give yourself a big boost by strengthening your willpower!

I got lucky this week!  Along with working with my one on one clients, I started working with a new group of 13 motivated men and women.  Our topic this week was mindset- one of my favorite subjects.

One of the mindset points I made was about generalizations- something I had noticed clients doing lately, and even catching myself a time or two.  Generalizations are words and phrases like:  all of the time, never, all men, all women, everytime I__________,  always, everything.   An example would be a salesperson saying something like “The market is bad and everyone is doing poorly right now.”  Or someone saying : “Everytime I try to meet new people it never works out.”  (two of them in that sentence, did you catch that?)

Generalizations are a cop out, an excuse, usually said with some level of drama.  The best way I have found to conquer generalization-itis is to just go on a campaign to stamp it out.  Just endeavor to become aware of doing it- don’t beat yourself up when you, just notice.  Be patient, you may have been generalizing for a long time!  When you notice that you have made a generalization, ask yourself that great question “Is is true?”  And if it is not true, go ahead and say what really IS true.  One of my clients generalized herself right out of many sales, believing that things were different than they were and not questioning it.  It happens all the time in all areas of our lives.  The things we are missing out on due to generalizations!

Another great tip is to tell others that you are on this campaign and ask them to hold you accountable.  They can ask you “Is that really true?” when they hear you generalizing.  Maybe they will even want to join you.

Why the big deal?  Generalizing dis-empowers you, allows you to play small and keeps you from reaching your goals.  If you are okay with this, and none of my clients are, then don’t sweat it.  If you are not, then go ahead- watch your mouth!

The journey to explore happiness is going to be a never ending one- I can see that- as there is so much great material out there- like the book The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin that I stumbled upon yesterday in NYC at the Anthropologie store.  The author tells her story about how she decides to expand happiness without changing her life by moving away or quitting her job or anything- just working with the life she has to make it happier.  I am looking forward to reading the full story.

I have noticed that there are many different theories- and it doesn’t matter what you believe- but what I take away from it all is that if we all focused a little on being happier ourselves, that would naturally extend to others and the world would just plain be a happier place to live!

Also, I think there is a bit of a tight rope to walk- so happiness is very purposeful.  I agree with those in the camp of staying present and enjoying what is happening right now, in every moment no matter what it is,  as much as possible.  I believe this can be done more often than we think, even with things we do not ordinarily equate with happy times, just by actually looking to see what could be good.  We may not be happy about the “thing” that we are doing, or what is happening, but we can decide to give it our best and to have gratitude for something. The other part of the balancing act is, I believe, to always have a tiny something to look forward to built into your days.  Something that is a treat for you in some way.  It also helps to have bigger things to look forward to, too, that are exciting to you.  The challenge is that it is up to you to create.  And the absolute blast is that it is up to you to create!

The balance is to have a good dose of both, I believe, things I look forward to and really paying attention to what is happening right now and pulling every morsel of happiness out of it.  Worry and anxiety over what MIGHT happen or our PERCEPTION of what did happen is generally not useful.  I love asking myself Byron Katie’s question “Is it true?” when ever the worries start to seep in, then I turn to what I am grateful for in my life.  This line of thinking helps me to stay on the path to happiness and enjoying as many minutes of my days as I possibly can.  It is a constant balancing act, but to me, it is well worth the effort!