Is it the pursuit of making more money or is it the pursuit of making more memories?
What are you making money for? I was recently talking to a business owner who decided to take the leap and be an entrepreneur. It is obviously no easy feat to go out to work for yourself. It requires a lot of money and a lot of time so you really need to be sure that this is what you want to do. You also want to make sure that the sacrifices you are making will be worth it. He is really doing a great job at it too. Having walked some of this journey with him initially his motivation was to have more time? But I asked is that why you should start a business. At our recent catch up he said it was to make more money. How much is enough money? What do you want the money for? It was this conversation that started me thinking about what is my purpose is it about making more money or is it about making more memories.
Where are you Spending Time?
This is something I think about how should I spend my time and what really brings me joy. My COVID experience has made this something I think about a lot more.
When you understand the things that bring you joy it is easier to allow life to pull you in certain directions. It is easier to be open to seeing the serendipitous moments too. I found myself being conscious about finding those moments you need to spend a little more time enjoying.
For me, it is small things that are often powerful;
An extra 5 minutes in bed in the morning enjoying an embrace from my husband. It is the sense of safety, relaxation and pure love. If I didn’t stop at that moment to take that in, to breathe in deeply I would miss it. I realise how lucky I am, and I try to take time to be grateful for life’s greatest joys and without a sense of gratitude I could miss it. I could easily get out of bed and get right in the busyness of the day.
The moment when I look out my window and know I have 3 incredible horses in my backyard. This was a childhood dream that I didn’t think was possible. When I go out in the paddock or look out my window it is about taking a mental picture and being present.
I love the mornings when my husband makes me poached eggs on toast. They are the most incredible poached eggs and no one else can make them as well. It is because every bit of them are done with love. The eggs come freshly laid by my free-range chooks and my husband knows how to poach the perfect egg. It is my favourite weekend breakfast along with the great coffee. I look forward to these breakfasts and I simply just savour the simplicity and perfection of the meal.
It is when my horse will master a new skill or something we have worked on together seems to come together finally. The time and hours put in it is those moments that provide me with elation.
Moments with my kids when there is laughter and when there is something new that they have mastered too. I have loved watching them grow into amazing humans.
The Joy of Giving
If you have ever had the opportunity to give someone something or do something that has really helped them, changed their day, or their life, you understand how powerful that is for you. There is something incredibly powerful in those moments where you can feel someones gratitude for making their life a little bit better. I love those memories these are ones I put on replay when I need to feel good as they always make me smile. I really love finding the perfect gift for someone.
Who do you want to be with?
Think about it: who would you rather spend your time with? Someone who is making money and spending all their free time doing so? Or someone who is making memories doing fun things with friends and family? Why do I ask this? Because in my experience, the people who are truly successful (and happy) have a balance between work and play. They don’t let work consume their whole lives. There are other things that matter to them besides making money. That’s not to say making more money can make you a lot happier than not having any money. I think that financial freedom is very powerful and being able to live a comfortable lifestyle certainly makes me a lot happier than being homeless.
Making More Money
I came from a working-class background. I know what it is like not to have money. I spent many years of my life making more money working harder than anyone else so that my children wouldn’t know what it is like to go without. I sacrificed a lot along the way and I still wonder whether it has been worth it all. I spent my time making more money it didn’t bring me the happiness I thought I would. I wanted to drive the fancy car, own my house and have fancy shoes. I guess what I have learned through this process is more things don’t make you happy. I have filled my life with having things and now I understand that people and places are what we remember on our deathbed, not the fancy things. It certainly won’t be my expensive coffee making coming to my bedside when I am sick and need someone.
Deathbed Moments
This is a profound question that was given to me by a young man who had too much life experience for someone his age. He had such a great time at Leading Together that he described it as a “deathbed memory”. I have started using this statement as my measuring stick and thinking is this a “deathbed memory” and I have started to realise it is the small things that are the most important. Having lost too many precious people too young you realise that things you miss the most are the simple things, not the grand gesture moments.
When you think about those precious life moments that you reflect on in your final hours what do you think that are they going to be? Making more money or making more memories.
Recently I was at a leadership forum and casually asked a colleague, “Have you got any plans over Christmas? Are you going away?” and he simply said, “I am resting hard”.
Well my first response was to burst out laughing and then the more I thought about this statement the more I thought that this is genius!
We all work hard, we play hard, we wear this like a badge of honour. Our exhaustion is seen as a status symbol. When you ask someone how are you, how often do you hear the response “busy”.
What COVID has brought home to me is burnout is real and so many people I know have got major health issues from not resting. It is simply not a great culture where we take pride in our hustle and collective fatigue. It’s not ok, and we shouldn’t keep on soldiering on through our exhaustion.
Resting
“Resting” is a simple concept that can take some time to master. It’s the art of disconnecting from your work, friends, and whatever else so you can relax and rejuvenate. If you don’t rest, you’ll burn out.
We see resting as a soft option and feel guilty for resting because we have been told if we are not busy, we are failing. But the opposite is so true. Resting more will actually give you more energy and make you feel better and perform better.
Sleep is the best performance-enhancing drug ever!! I have experienced extreme ends of the rest continuum. Ask any new mum with an unsettled child what lack of sleep does to you. Any parent who is sleep-deprived will tell you emphatically how much better he/she feels with a decent nights sleep.
But it isn’t just sleep that is important for rest. You need to create habits that allow you to switch off. The first step to resting more is getting into a habit of resting every day. This will prevent you from being overworked and burnt out. The second step to rest is using exercises like yoga and meditation to help you relax and reset your mind. They are beneficial to both physical and mental health, but also help us enjoy life more.
Resting and recharging your batteries is about ensuring you take time to do the things that give you energy and fill you up. Everyone has a place, hobby or exercise which gives them joy. Mindfulness comes to people in so many different ways. It could be as simple as a walk around the block with the dog.
Leaders Need Rest Too
Even the most hard-charging business leaders need time to recharge their batteries. We all know that leading a company requires long hours and tons of energy, but it takes much more than that to stay sharp and motivated.
Just as a machine needs maintenance, so does the human body. Our bodies require rest and relaxation in order to function at the highest level. Some people take a lot of time off, while others prefer to get away from their daily grind by getting outdoors and exercising with friends. Some people prefer to take an hour to reflect on their goals with a quiet walk around the block. Or maybe it is scheduling your regular yoga session.
Without rest, you cannot find the creativity and mental function required to solve complex problems. You will find you have more capacity to help and support everyone around you if you help yourself first.
Rest Guilt-Free
Today, most people feel guilty when they take time off. It’s as if the world is going to stop spinning and explode if they aren’t working. They have an underlying belief that time spent away from work is wasted time, which only causes more stress. But what if I told you that taking a break actually makes you more productive? That’s right! When you take time off, your mind is more relaxed and ready for work. And there’s more good news! Taking regular breaks will eventually make you more productive and allow you to get more done in less time
Work at Resting
Imagine if we put as much time and effort into learning how to rest as we did learning a new skill. Resting Hard is a concept that requires effort, it requires conscious time, put it in the diary. Prioritise it. Your body and mind will thank you. Your family will thank you. But also your staff will thank you for bringing your best version to work. We are not built to squeeze more into our days. Even God had to take a day off. So if it is good enough for him then I might just work on doing it too.
So for now I am going to work on simply “resting hard”.
The beliefs that we hold are just patterns that we’ve learned and developed over the years. There are a number of things throughout our lives that play a role in shaping our beliefs. Some of these might be supporting and nurturing, while others might be roadblocks on our paths to achieving happiness. Positive affirmations are a great way to change the barriers into supportive and encouraging truths. You can use positive affirmations to keep you moving forward. Here are four useful tips for writing positive affirmations that work.
Write Down Your Ideas
You need to take the time to determine what areas of your life you want to improve. Write down your ideas on how you would like your life to look and areas that you want to improve. After you’ve written down your thoughts, take a look at each of them and write down a few positive statements that reflect your vision for your future life.
Use the Present Tense
When you write down your affirmations, you want to be sure to write them in the present tense. Write them down as though you are experiencing everything you desire right now. You want to avoid using words like, within the next two months. . . because every time you use this affirmation you are saying to yourself and the universe that you are still two months away from achieving your goal. After you use this affirmation for one month, you will still be saying, within two months, which tells the universe and your mind that you haven’t gotten any closer to achieving your goals.
Focus on What You Want
You need to write your affirmations in a way that forces them to focus on what you want in life, rather than what you are trying to eliminate or avoid in your life. For example, rather than writing I’m not addicted to alcohol, a better option would be to write something like, I am completely free from alcohol. If you aren’t sure about how to write an affirmation in the positive, then you can imagine that you’ve already accomplished whatever it is that you want to achieve and describe yourself in that positive light.
Writing positive affirmations is both an empowering and exciting experience. Learn how to enjoy the process and try not to get caught up in the details of what you’re writing. Have fun with the process and try to relax.
Living in a world where we are constantly comparing ourselves to others, can have the sad result of us losing ourselves while trying to be more like everyone we see on social media. We find ourselves judging ourselves and others.
In order to live your purpose in life and to be authentically you the first step is to understand who you are. This requires you to be vulnerable and aware of – your weaknesses, your strengths, your beliefs, your goals, your personality, your motivations, and your morals.
These are all the traits that make you who are you and how you respond to the world. Once you understand what you are made of and you have to realize that all of those aspects are capable of changes and improvement.
In this guide, we’ll give you tips on how you can ultimately increase your self-awareness for the greater purpose of becoming the best version of yourself. Self-awareness is one of the key factors in improving your emotional intelligence.
Attracting Awareness
It’s easier said than done, we know! But it all starts with a suggestion to your brain, which can then get it through its filter and allow it to have an impact on how you feel, think and experience.
Let’s have a look at the 4 things you can do to become more self-aware!
1. Get To Know You
Have you ever sat down with yourself and asked the question: “Who am I?”
And more importantly… Would you be able to answer that question if it was asked of you?
The first step in building a healthy awareness of yourself is to understand who you truly are when you look at yourself objectively.
This step is easier if you think about yourself from an outsider perspective. Think about how people who know you well would answer. I find this is the easiest place to start. How would your best friend describe you? How would your family describe you and then you can start to dig a little deeper. Then you can think about your own perceptions of yourself if you were to look at yourself objectively.
During this process, you shouldn’t compare yourself to others, but rather look at yourself as an individual without comparisons while looking at your accomplishments, interests, beliefs, and personality.
Granted, though, you will never be able to map out your entirety on a piece of paper, but you can get to know the most frequently occurring patterns you have, that make the most of your life.
2. Journaling
One of the best ways to keep track of your daily emotions, reactions, and feelings is to keep a journal in which you write down those things.
It’s amazing how putting pen to paper can really put things into perspective;
Writing down your feelings, thoughts, failures and successes of the day will give you a fresh view of how you deal with things.
Journaling is a means of self-reflection to not only see your strengths, but also your weaknesses as it gives you the objective perspective to change bad reactions in the future.
Recording your daily way of acting and reacting will also help you clear your mind and open up space for positive energy.
During our daily lives we can become quite robotic as if we are on autopilot just cruising through our schedules and before we know it, weeks and months have flown by.
To savour every moment of the day, we have to be more mindful of what we do, this means being aware of good and bad habits while enforcing better habits more.
Trying to keep up with a fast-paced world can keep us from enjoying small pleasures like breathing in fresh air or simply going for a stroll around the neighbourhood.
Which tasks during your day give you a sense of serenity, calmness, and happiness?
Is it washing the dishes, meditating, cooking, or exercising?
Ensure that you do these kinds of activities more!
4. Ask For Feedback
Even though it might be a bit scary, it’s important to know what our friends, family, and even colleagues think about us and our behaviour.
Ask those closest to you to give an honest and open, but critical and objective, description of who they see you as, to give you a better idea of what people truly think of you.
Honest feedback from people around us will give us a better idea of who we are and how our behaviour affects our everyday lives.
Obviously, it’s important that you remain open-minded and non-offensive during an honest feedback session from a friend, listening with an open heart might help you recognize something within yourself you never knew was there.
In the end to be more self-aware, switch off your devices and go inward to discover the true you.
Once you make contact with the authentic person inside, you are well on your way to improve relationships around you and your emotional intelligence. You’ll in fact exit the main sequence of emotional and behavioural patterns, opening room for more, new experiences and things.
Have you ever experienced a sound or smell that transports you to a different time and place in your life? Well, that moment happened to me today.
I have horses with colds at the moment. I don’t know how, but one of them got a cold and now they all have it. It feels a little bit like when your child brings home those disgusting germs from school or daycare and then spreads to everyone.
So I am mixing up my horse feeds with every supplement that could possibly make them better at dinner time. No one is really enjoying the “fancy and expensive stuff” in their food and not eating it.
Ahh. But I have a solution molasses! Horses love it and it disguises all the yucky stuff.
Well, this is when I was immediately transported to a different time and place in my life. I opened the tin of molasses and the smell made my grandmother appear right with me, to a time and a place when I was a very young girl bringing back to life such fond memories.
I am about 6 years old standing in her small country kitchen. She was telling me I needed to have a teaspoon of molasses because it was good for me. My grandmother used to swear by it. Everyone, man and beast would be given molasses regardless of whether they needed it or not.
The smell made me smile and reminds me of a time place and moment that was special to me.
My grandmother passed away earlier this year and this smell reminded me of the power of those small moments that make life so memorable.
I wonder if this has happened to you? Remember your loved ones will remember those small mundane moments just as much as big grand gestures. It’s reminded me to create a memory worth remembering.
