Category: Life Lessons

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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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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 Life Lessons Perspective Problem Relationship Success

Don’t Do This, If You Want What You Want

This article and insight is inspired by time spent in the kitchen the other day.

I was in the kitchen the other day with my partner Ferry (who happens to be an awesome cook).

She said something that got me thinking.

And brought us to today’s conversation.

A conversation which includes politicians, fraudsters, hypnotherapists and probably we could put a 4-year old into the mix as well.

The thing that happened with Ferry in the kitchen was this…

It was a very simple comment.

Ferry said: “Can you put some water into the kettle?” (I am pretty sure she did not say please).

As I went about this chore I am thinking exactly how much water is ‘some’?

“Some” is pretty non-descriptive.

It’s a pretty broad generalization.

Do I put in a teaspoon, a tablespoon, a half cup, a full cup, a couple of cups??

I have no clue.

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consciousness Decision Making Life Lessons Overwhelm Perspective

How to Stay Up-to-date Globally Without Losing Your Mind

The other day I was in conversation with friends, and we were talking about ‘world affairs’.

But the most interesting part of that conversation – for me – is how do we stay informed, without being consumed by a whole bunch of ‘bad news’?

And what do we mean being informed?

Is it informed for interest sake?

Is it informed, so we can make informed decisions in our own lives?

Is it informed so we can sound like we know what’s going on in the world to impress our friends?

And how informed do we need to be?

Lots of questions, and playing around in them can make your head spin.

So in this article I want to give you my thoughts and perspective on how to stay informed, to what level, and in a way that is beneficial for you and your lifestyle generation, plus in a way that you don’t lose your sanity, or sense of life being something precious.

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Choice consciousness Decision Making Feeling Life Lessons Perspective

Tough Decisions, Complexity, Better Questions and Cute Dogs

Yes; we will be discussing all of those topics.

As they weave together.

Regardless of whether you are a ‘dog person’ or not, I am sure you will get where I am coming from, and take something of value from this conversation.

Over the last bunch of weeks I have had some really tough decisions to make in relationship to dogs, which have not been easy.

Time to really practice what I teach.

All of which I have written about over this year and are in my latest book (18 Ways We Make Life Way Harder Than It Needs To Be) and YES, that is a ridiculously blatant plug for my new book, but I am okay with that as I know it will serve you well.

Now let’s jump straight into the life of Carl Massy story time…

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Choice Life Lessons Nutrition Optimum Health Perspective

Wisdom, Discernment and What’s for Breakfast?

You know I am a fan of wisdom.

I am also a fan of discernment, critical-thinking and sensing what is ‘self-evident’.

Having read a book recently that was a deep-dive into the differences between the right and left hemispheres, it is pretty clear that our education systems and societal systems in general favour a left-brain bias (and worldview).

This means being taught what to think (by people supposedly smarter than us) and not being taught ‘how to think.’

Wisdom is about knowing how to think and then applying that knowledge in a conscious way.

And it turns out that the right brain is best for discerning BS, so stretching our minds a little more is definitely in our favour.

Mindfulness practices like meditation help develop the right hemisphere, by expanding our consciousness, and dropping into the interconnection of everything.

Everything is connected (as quantum physics agrees with).

Whereas the left hemisphere is about reductionism, fixation, inflexibility, judgement and making stuff up.

So, having said that, and having created some context for what I want to support you with (becoming wiser) let me get back the topic of “What’s for breakfast?”

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Belief Choice Doubt Fear Feeling Growth Life Lessons Overwhelm

This Can Break The Dam Wall of Worry

This article is for anyone that does, or is currently doing, the WORRY thing.

It’s a story about what I recently did (about 30 mins before writing) to break the dam of worry that had been looming over me for days.

If you read last weeks post, I spoke about getting triggered putting up ‘For Sale’ signs around my neighborhood, as we are in the process of selling our house in Bali (while doing a build at the same time).

So I am juggling a few balls in the air.

Which I am sure that you can relate to.

I am 100% sure.

Rarely have we got all of our ducks lined up so we can kick back with our feet up, and be in blissful rapture.

The price of wanting to live an extraordinary life is there will be a bit of resistance, disruption, set-back and frustration.

It’s the ticket price to play life at the next level.

So I know that you know what I am talking about.

Life can get pretty overwhelming at times.

And then we can do this worry thing.

Which I like to thank my mum for teaching me.

She taught me well.

Just joking mum!!

(Sort of).

So that takes me to one of my main points of today’s ‘lessons’.

Drum roll please maestro…

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Fear Feeling Life Lessons Negative Emotions Perspective Problem

How to Stop Getting Triggered

One of the primary things I do when working with new clients is have them record when they get TRIGGERED.

This information is gold dust.

Outstanding feedback.

BUT…only if you do something with it.

We all get triggered.

But IT is the wisest among us who learn from it, in order to grow and evolve and to not get triggered (as much or not at all) next time.

Firstly let me define what I mean by ‘Getting Triggered‘.

It is essentially any time where we are reactively taken out of an elevated emotional state, neutral state or homeostasis, and dropped into a survival emotional state. Essentially the amygdala has determined there is some sort of physical threat, so it activates the sympathetic nervous system, and we have a physiological fight, flight or freeze response. This does not include automatic responses to real physical threats.

Sometimes we are ‘positively’ triggered and that is awesome and another great thing to learn from.

Thumbs up and now do more of that.

However, for this article (and your ongoing well-being) I am more interested in the ‘negative‘ triggers, and the bigger the trigger, the more (loving) attention we need to give them.

Examples include: getting triggered by an email, getting triggered while driving on the road, getting triggered by your partner or friends, getting triggered by people wearing face masks while alone on a beach, getting triggered by being told ‘no’, getting triggered by people riding motorbikes through intersections while texting on their phones, etc..

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Choice Emotional Fear Growth Life Lessons

A Sneak Peak Inside My Next Book

I have been threatening to send you a sample from my upcoming book, so here is the PREFACE, which gives you a sense of where I am going with the book, plus I get to share with you some of my (mis)adventures and insights along the way.

Please enjoy.

PREFACE

“It is through science that we prove, but through intuition that we discover.”

Henry Poincare (French Mathematician)

Have you ever been to Bali (Indonesia)?

What a magical place. Beaches. Balinese massages. Sunshine. Great surfing. Outstanding food (did anyone tell you Bali is a food mecca?). Beautiful local people. Such an amazing place to relocate to, in order to start the next phase of your life journey and professional transition. What could possibly go wrong?

And yes, I was chuckling as I wrote that line, as I am sure at some points in your life you have uttered those very same magical and fateful words. “What could possibly go wrong?”

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Acceptance Choice Decision Making Life Lessons Perspective

Knowing Thyself is Not Enough, You Also Need to…

We have all heard the philosophical maxim, “Know Thyself” attributed to the Greek Temple of Apollo in Delphi.

It sounds pretty cool.

And it is a bloody great idea.

But there is a catch.

“Know Thyself” usually focuses our attention on the attainment of ‘knowledge‘.

Versus ‘Wisdom‘, which comes from knowledge AND experience (plus a healthy serving of consciousness).

So…

It is super awesome to know thyself, but it is even more awesome as to what you do (experience) with that knowledge.

And thus begins our story…

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