5 Things I Practice to Create A Fulfilling, Meaningful & Fun Life

If one of these resonates with you, please make sure you APPLY it in your own life. And feel free to modify it to suit you and your specific needs.

Practice Number 1

ACTIVELY practice GRATITUDE

Before I started writing these Tips, I meditated and then I focused on 5-10 things that I was grateful for. This is an active practice. Something I choose to do.

The reasons I choose to do it are three-fold: 1) I feel great doing it, 2) I feel great after I do it, 3) there is a healthy amount of research to suggest that over the long-term it makes a real and measurable difference in your default level of happiness.

It also brings PERSPECTIVE into my life, which is one of the antidotes to ‘stress’. When I realise how good I have it, I physically calm down the part of my brain that thinks my survival is genuinely at risk.

 

Practice Number 2

ACTIVELY practice MEDITATION (aka: sitting still)

I don’t need to reiterate to you all of the anecdotal and scientific evidence as to why meditation is one of the best practices for our lives. You know that if you have followed any of my work. But what I do want is to tell you HOW.

When you get up in the morning, go and sit on a couch or chair, close your eyes and just pay attention to your breathing and body sensations. Do it for at least 2 mins.

THAT’S IT!!

If you tell me you don’t have time for that, then you and I both know you are a ‘liar, liar, pants on fire!‘ or you don’t like yourself or your loved ones enough. Know this will make you a better, more loving and more loved person – which I know you and your family deserve.

 

Practice Number 3

See EVERYTHING as an OPPORTUNITY for GROWTH

I heard a great statement yesterday. Someone was talking about things that happen in their life. They said that the things that happen in their life are either GREAT or GREAT STORIES.

There is no bad stuff. Just an opportunity for a great story. They were suggesting that while they are in the middle of a complete personal disaster, they are thinking to themselves, “Man this is going to make one hell of a story when I get to the other end!” I apply this in my own life.

I have a belief that says that life is here to challenge me to show up as the biggest version of myself. I get thrown ‘issues and challenges and disasters’ because I know that I need resistance and discomfort to grow. Life does not hate any of us. Life wants us to shine, because when we do we make the world a better place. EVERYTHING is an opportunity to learn, to experience, and to grow into a more powerful version of ourselves.

 

Practice Number 4

Be YOU

This takes SO much less energy. No need for projecting what you think people want to see. No need to act as if you are someone else – unless you are getting paid $10 million to do it! That is what some people (called actors) get paid to become someone else and they get paid these big numbers because it is REALLY hard and consumes LOTS OF ENERGY to become someone you are not.

So unless you are getting paid $10 million to be someone else, be YOU. And be YOU in an unapologetic way. If think people won’t don’t like YOU, know a lot of people also didn’t (and don’t) like Buddha, Jesus, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King Jnr, Gandhi, the Dalai Lama, and Carl Massy. You will not be the first person to make everyone like you. So give up on being someone you think you need to be in order to have everyone like you, because it is an unattainable goal where you are GUARANTEED to lose. 

If you cannot be YOU where you are – at work or home or in a club or church or social circle or … – then here is what I recommend is these 3-Steps:

1. Don’t ASSUME you can’t be YOU
2. Be YOU
3. If being YOU still does not work then change locations / friends / job / lifestyle / etc.

YOU need to BE YOU. The unique YOU adds to the spice, variety and deliciousness of this thing called life.

 

Practice Number 5

Make life a GAME or add more GAMES to your life

‘Why so serious?’ the Joker said to Batman.

I am smiling as I write this. I am definitely guilty of taking myself way too seriously on occasions. Know you can do serious work (I used to be a bomb management specialist for mega events), but that does not mean you have to be a sour puss. I used to have a lot of fun in that role, when I wasn’t taking myself too serious.

Lighten up.

One of the things I have been working on in my business is to play a game to see how many “No’s” I can get from prospective clients and opportunities. I also know that ‘yes’ lives in the land of ‘no’, but making a GAME of what I am doing lightens things up.

Bring more games and fun into your life. Play a GAME where you make today the day where you are 100% honest (like the movie The Invention of Lying with Ricky Gervais in it). Just see what happens. Make a GAME of seeing how much you can shock or surprise a co-worker or family member. Make a GAME of seeing how many different ways you can drive to work. Make a GAME of seeing how many things you can tick off your list of ‘The Top 10 Things That Scare Me Most’.

Make life more of a GAME. Bring more joy and levity into what you are doing. Add more GAMES into your life. Don’t be so serious. Life can be a whole lot more FUN for us all, when we get creative about making up and playing games.

 

Wrapping Up

So here are 5 other things (and no surprises):

1. Help others
2. Move your body more
3. Don’t take things personally (one of the Agreements from the awesome book The Four Agreements)
4. Don’t be too proud (or stupid) to ask for help
5. Eat real food (it is crazy that this even needs to be said ;-))

So what could you apply or re-apply or introduce or re-introduce more of, into your life?

And what could you also add to the list?
Feel free to share in an email or a post on Facebook or on my Blog.

Have an awesome day and see you next week! 😉

 

Please ask any questions you have. Plus I love hearing feedback from you on what resonated for you. Also do me and others a huge favour and pass them on. Knowledge used in the right way is definitely a way to access our incredible power. All the very best and take care.