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One Of The Biggest (And Most Common) Energy Drains

In order for you and me to be at our most awesome, we need the highest amount of ENERGY we can generate.

We do this by putting great fuel into our bodies.

Getting plenty of sunshine and fresh air.

Moving our bodies mindfully.

Staying hydrated.

Sleeping well, and a bunch of other stuff, I often talk about.

The other way to maintain high energy is to not WASTE it on stuff that is not important.

Which is where we are going today.

We will be looking at a common place people waste, mismanage, throw away and recklessly spend their valuable energy reserves. 

If you waste 20% of energy on something that doesn’t add value to your life, you only have 80% in your tank to play the game of life with.

Yes, you can generate more, but that takes time.

So let’s make sure we don’t waste energy needlessly.

Which brings me to this…

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consciousness Decision Making Growth Life Lessons Overwhelm Perspective Stress Success

Mental Pushing And Pulling – Thanks To Our Biology

Where to start?

How about with the name of the book I just finished reading, which shared pretty interesting insights. The book was called: ‘Why You’re Unhappy’ by Loretta Graziano Breuning, PhD.

I didn’t agree with everything she presented, but because she has a background in anthropology as well as psychology, it brought a nice perspective to her discussion on biology.

And the influence on our feelings and behaviours.

She spoke a lot about the individual roles of dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins and cortisol; and how they are primarily used for survival (and reproduction of genes), as with all mammals.

I have talked before about the ‘mid’ brain, also called the limbic brain or mammalian brain.

It has a number of functions including regulation and generation of our emotions, which obviously affects us moment-to-moment and day-to-day.

I found a few things in this book especially fascinating.

Particularly the author’s overarching message.

We are not – biologically – designed to be ‘happy’ all the time.

It is not only okay, but “normal” to feel our emotions go up and go down throughout our day and life in general.

I think that is a great point.

If we EXPECT to be happy, all the time, or think there is something “wrong” with us if we aren’t, then we may be fighting reality.

What I also found fascinating was…

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Choice Decision Making Perspective Success

The Bigger The ‘Gap’, The Bigger The Frustration & Disappointment

Let’s jump straight in.

Have you ever heard the following statement or philosophy?

The size of the GAP between the REALITY and your EXPECTATIONS, determines the amount of discomfort (frustration, anger, disappointment, etc.) you will experience.

As shown in my diagram further down.

Small GAP = small discomfort.

BIG GAP = BIG (emotional) PAIN. So today I want to look at the biggest EXPECTATION Boo-Boo’s (aka: mistakes) many people erroneously make.

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Choice Growth Success

The Easy Way To Build Great Habits

I spoke about HABITS the other day.

Plus last week I spoke about the relationship between Goals and Process, as the authors of Tiny Habits and Atomic habits shared the same pint of view.

I also mentioned I would do a deeper overview of the book Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg, which I read recently.

It really is a great book (strategically) plus ol’ BJ, who is a Standford professor, is not writing to impress people with his literary skills, but is actually passionate about serving other people. 

It is great to see an academic who is more interested in the impact of his work, than academic accolades.

Thanks BJ!!

Essentially, there are a few BIG points to takeaway from his book and decades of practical application.

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Choice Decision Making Goal Setting Tips Success

Which Is More Important For Success: The Right Goal Or The Right Process?

The other day I was in a funky local cafe.

And part of their cool vibe was having paperback books you could read while hanging out there.

I spotted one of my fave books so I picked it up and flipped it open.

It was Atomic Habits by James Clear (and exceptionally great book).

I started reading the section that I had randomly flicked it open to and started to chuckle to myself.

I LOVE synchronicity and coincidence (which I consider means my alignment is good). 

The reason I chuckled is because I was reading a book on my Kindle earlier in the day by Scott Adams (the creator of the Dilbert comic strips), and he not only mentioned the same thing, but referenced back to James Clear and Atomic Habits as another person that agrees with this concept.

Therefore, I took that as a nudge that I need to share their insights and observations with you.

So here we go.

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Choice Decision Making Emotional Goal Setting Tips Overwhelm Success

The 1, 2, 3 to Getting More Clarity

The title may be a little misleading.

I was actually not thinking of step 1, step 2, and step 3.

But rather, Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3, when it comes to getting more CLARITY.

And in this case, the levels also refer to the size of the ‘problem’ or issues, or the size of the consequences of the decisions you have to make.

Let’s think of it like this:

Level 1 – A problem or decision to solve or figure out, but that is not too big or high in consequences.

Level 2 – The problem or decisions is a bigger, or more complex, and has more consequences if you “F” it up.

Level 3 – This is where the decisions you are making are complex, there numerous overlapping parts, and possibly a shortage of resources, so you need to be extra creative, plus the consequences of “F’ing it up” are pretty high (and potentially a huge pain in the butt and maybe even a potential financial loss).

So I see that these three levels of “challenge” require three different ENVIRONMENTS to enhance the probability of me solving it to the best of my ability.

I also like to use the metaphor of ‘stepping back’.

Level 1 = small step back.

Level 2 = medium size step backwards.

Level 3 = a big step backwards to allow the greatest level of perspective.

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Choice Happiness Tips Joy Perspective Success

Learn a Simple Neurological Mood Booster

Who likes easy?

I know hard is where we build up our muscles.

BUT I do like the idea of a mix of easy, hard, and very little harder-than-it-NEEDS-to-be.

Life doesn’t have to be all about hard, sweaty, and grunts and groans for us to be succeeding.

Let’s sprinkle in a bit of easy with today’s tip on boosting our mood.

You know I am a fan of the idea that we can actually (self) create an elevated emotion state in our bodies, which causes a specific set of neuro-chemicals and hormones to be released throughout the body.

Re-enforcing the created feeling and supporting our overall health and well-being.

I want to take that concept, and a concept I read recently in a book by a Stanford behavioural scientist – BJ Fogg – called Tiny Habits (which I will review for you in a couple of weeks when I finish it).

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Acceptance Doubt Emotional Growth Life Lessons Meditation Perspective Stress

How is Your Patience Going? Want More?

So…

How is your patience?

If you are anything like me, then at times it is crap.

I was just talking to my partner – Ferry – about ‘having patience’ the other night, as we transit between our farm and our ‘main’ house, waiting for the sale of our ‘main’ house, before we finish building our other ‘main’ house on our farm.

I don’t like mortgages, so I need to exercise the ‘patience’ to wait for the sale of our house, which is dragging on, and on and on…

So I have spent intimate time face-to-face with the thing called patience of late and I – as always – want to figure out how I can do it better.

At first I thought you can’t ‘force’ patience.

As in, you can’t DO stuff to make ‘more’ patience.

Because it is more about surrendering, letting go, and stepping back.

BUT…

Then I sat with and went deeper to understand patience from all angles and this is what I came up with.

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Choice Decision Making Emotional Overwhelm Problem

An Awesome Problem-Solving Tool

Firstly, the ESP is not (exactly) extra sensory perception, though perhaps there is some of that still going on.

Secondly, it is thanks to a client conversation the other day for the creation of this tool.

Or more, the synthesizing of a few different tools into one.

The idea came after seeing the usual pattern when we have a PROBLEM show up in our lives.

The usual flow looks like this:

Problem > Trigger > REACTION > Emotional Explosion (big or small) > Trying to solve problem > OUTCOME

One of the major downsides of this is the OUTCOME.

Which is actually the most important bit.

Usually the outcome – using this pathway – is that it “might” be okay in the short-term, but is very unlikely to be useful or appropriate over the long-term.

The reason is that when we are in a survival emotional state (which this sets up), we have limited access to the frontal cortex of our brain, which is where we ENVISION (realistic) future consequences of our choices.

We are in short-term survival mode.

Not ‘making-choices-to-shape-your-greatest-destiny’ mode.

So we need to INTERRUPT the pattern.

This is where our ESP Tool comes in.

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10 Tips: “Finding your Purpose”

I was doing an online presentation the other day for a group, when I was asked a question.

It related to ‘Purpose’.

And it was a combination of how do we ‘find’ our purpose, and how do we live a purpose inspired life?

It was a pretty good question, and probably relevant for many people.

So let me share with you my thoughts on the topic.

Firstly, I think there is great psychological benefit in having something to aim for, and a clear path to walk.

I think it was Aristotle who said we are teleological beings; meaning we are at our best when we have a target to aim for.

Where the target might be something one year into our future, or even what I would call our North Star.

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