Working with your guides

Being grateful for the irritant

organizationalhabits Building your personal brand, Decision making, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , ,

At the Good Life Project camp last weekend, founder Jonathan Fields did a talk on podcasting. We were chatting about what makes a great interview, and of course, it’s when the presenter has a good story. But a good story is rarely a story where everything goes right.

Why? Because:

  1. No one believes the presenter.
  2. There’s little emotion or take-away.
  3. We don’t tend to like a person who tells us everything in their life is perfect.

Jonathan gave the example of a person who says he grew up in a terrific family, got into a great school, and ended up in investment banking – only to find out he really, really loves investment banking. This may sound like a great life but it isn’t a great story. Continue reading →

What if?

organizationalhabits Big project ideas, Building your personal brand, Business tips, Changing habits, Decision making, Finding your "why", Getting started, Organizational Exercises, Productivity tips for work, Working with your guides , , , , , , , ,

At the Good Life Project camp this weekend, the opening and closing question was the same: “What if?”

GLP is a camp for entrepreneurs who would like to change the world, so the keynote speakers’ “What ifs” were bold. Continue reading →

Fresh sailing

organizationalhabits Big project ideas, Building your personal brand, Business tips, Changing habits, Decision making, Finding your "why", Organizational Exercises, Productivity tips for work, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , , , ,

I’m spending the weekend at an entrepreneur’s conference in upstate New York. Our host is podcaster and author Jonathan Fields. About four years ago, Jonathan published a video blog about how cool summer camps were for kids and wondered why adults didn’t have the same kind of fun. So he invented The Good Life Project Camp.

I have attended every summer since.

Here’s why. Continue reading →

Taking time to ponder

organizationalhabits Building your personal brand, Changing habits, Decision making, Meditation, Organizational Exercises, Productivity tips for work, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , ,

Do you wake up to an alarm? If you do, you may be missing some of your best thinking time. When an alarm goes off, your mind is jarred and any thoughts are generally lost. If you can get to bed early enough to get a solid night’s sleep without waking up to alarm, it’s fun to let your mind wander before you jump out of bed.

“Theta time” is when you’re kind of groggy but awake. If you can push yourself to stay in bed and float for 10, 20, or even 30 minutes, you might be surprised what you come up with. Continue reading →

The glass is already broken

organizationalhabits Building your personal brand, Changing habits, Decision making, Meditation, Organizational Exercises, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , , , ,

When I’m feeling too attached to something – an object, a person, or an outcome – I meditate on the Buddhist saying, “The glass is already broken.”

When you start to sweat the small stuff, and remember that it’s all small stuff, you have to know that this will pass. We’re in a constant state of change with new beginnings and new endings every day.

And, like the glass, we’re here for a short time. Continue reading →

Get out of the briar patch

organizationalhabits Big project ideas, Building your personal brand, Business tips, Changing habits, Decision making, Finding your "why", Organizational Exercises, Planning impacts on your health, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s so important in life to do what you say you’re going to do and to be fully committed. But if you feel your energy drain when you’re in your briar patch or even think about your briar patch, it might be time to get out.

The weird thing about briar patches is they’re not all that easy to get into – whether your briar patch is a job, a house, a relationship. You worked hard to get where you are! And we all like forward motion so the tendency is to keep moving, hoping that things will magically get better. Continue reading →

The art of deciding

organizationalhabits Building your personal brand, Business tips, Changing habits, Decision making, Meditation, Setting organizational priorities, Working with your guides , , , , , ,

You may think you make a lot of decisions, but most of what you do each day is driven by habit. What time you get up. What you eat for breakfast. What you do for exercise. How you get to work. Even the conversations you have can be driven by habit. “You say this. Then I say that. Then you say this.”

So it’s no surprise that when you have to make a decision, it can be hard on your brain and rather unsettling – especially if it’s a decision that leads to big changes – like where you live. Or go to school. Or who you date or marry. Or what you do for work.

I like living a Zen life and feeling unsettled is very un-Zen. So how do we make decisions easier? Continue reading →

When you’re having a bad day…

organizationalhabits Baby steps to start getting organized, Building your personal brand, Meditation, Organizational Exercises, Planning impacts on your health, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , , ,

I’m just finishing an audio version of Sharon Salzberg’s book Real Happiness at Work. Sharon’s focus, as always, is on practicing loving kindness.

Here are three tips  from Sharon if you’re having a bad day: Continue reading →

A community takes action

organizationalhabits Building your personal brand, Business tips, Decision making, Organizational Exercises, Staying focused, Working with your guides , , , , , , ,

This incredible story ran in yesterday’s Washington Post.

What was incredible to me was that help was on the way. Police were on the scene. But someone – one person in a large crowd of beach-goers – decided to take action. And that one person and their one decision helped save at least one if not all ten of the people, including two children, who were stuck in a horrendous riptide.

There are a number of studies that show most humans will not help if they think someone else is going to step up to the plate. Those studies say if you want help and a crowd is nearby, you need to point your finger at one specific person and ask, “Will you help me?” Continue reading →