BALANCED GARDENING

This blog is not called “Secret2anamazinggarden” but please allow me to dispense with some gardening advice. First you start with some seeds. Some you may have picked out, some you may have just found in the garage or the basement and thought it may be fun to grow. At least that is how it seems to work in my family. Now you must choose a place for your garden to grow. You pick a fine spot one which has both enough shade and enough sun for a good garden needs the right mix of both. Then you prepare the land for the garden. Clearing away debris, rocks and anything else that may inhibit the plants from growing. Then you plant the seeds, water them and begin the wait for them to grow. You know they will take a few days to a few weeks for the plants to sprout so you do not expect to harvest a crop the next day. Now as the days pass you continue to water and take care of what you have planted to give them the best chance to grow. Soon something starts to grow in your garden. If your luck is anything like mine they are called weeds. Sometimes they even sprout before the things we have planted. So you must work on removing them to allow the plants to grow. The next day you come out and sure enough your plants have started to grow! Unfortunately so have more weeds. You think didn’t I just remove these yesterday? So you water the plants and pull the weeds. Then you notice a small little worm starting to eat the leaves of your plants. Great you got rid of the weeds now you have pests to deal with too? So you take steps to remove the pests, water your plants, maybe even fertilize them a bit and pull the weeds. This whole production goes on for weeks, perhaps even months. After which time you begin to be able to pick some fruits and vegetables. Some plants only give you one harvest, others continue to provide as long as you take care of them.

Ok, so what does all this have to do with living an amazing life? The steps to growing a good garden are fairly easy to understand even though they do take a good amount of time and effort. Honestly so are the steps to growing an amazing life. They are also quite similar. Let’s compare. The seeds are like your skills and talents. Some you are just born with, others you may choose and wish to develop. The spot for your garden is like the life you chose. You need enough sun and shade. Time to shine and time to relax. Even if your plot of ground is not ideal with the right effort you can still grow a very good garden. So you plant your seeds or choose your skills and talents you wish to develop. Now here is where some people get off track. They water them once and expect a crop the next day. Everything in life takes time. Sometimes even longer than it normally should. A plant will take longer to sprout if the weather is cool and there is a lack of sun. So a talent may take longer to develop if some key ingredients are missing. Continue to take care of them both and they will surely grow. Now come the weeds which can be likened to the challenges that arise in our life. Often before our talents had a chance to get started. Now when the first weed pops up do we give up on the garden? I hope not or you will never grow anything. Still if we do not do our best to remove the weed it will continue to grow and take over our garden. The same can be true of our challenges and weaknesses. If we do not strive to improve them eventually they will choke out any chance of a good life for us. So now your plants start to sprout, or in the case of your life you begin to see your talents come to light. If you only focus on removing the weeds or improving your weaknesses and never water your plants or build your strengths they will surely die. This is a curse of even the person with the best intentions on self-improvement. They often see it as just “fixing the problems with themselves” That is only roughly 50% of the plan. You must also grow the good that is in you. Develop it fully so you can bring the most to the world. So we come to the pests. What do they represent in the real world? Well, simply put, pests. They are the negative people who come into our lives and begin to eat our dreams and hold us back from our goals. if we do nothing to eliminate them or at the very least reduce their effect on our lives we will have no garden at all. Now much like a garden more weeds and pests will always come up and at times it might seem frustrating but if we keep watering our plants and pulling the weeds quite often they will provide us with far more fruits than we expected. So work on not only removing the challenges in your life and improving your weaknesses, but growing your talents. Try to at least make that a 50/50 effort, but understand much like in a garden both will continue in order for us to continue you reap our harvest

GRAPH OF PROGRESS

As you can see in the graph most prices has both its ups and downs. Just stay focused on your goal and keep moving forward. Whether your goal is to improve your financial situation or your relationship there is very seldom a straight line up. Nor should there be. The beautiful thing about the downs is that is forces us to refocus. If everything is going along smoothly there is little motivation to think about improvement. When things start slipping away then we often are forced to take things seriously and work harder. It is quite often after someone suffers a heart attack or some other health scare that they suddenly adopt a healthy lifestyle they have been avoiding. When someone loses some of their income they often start to review their budget. We grow from our challenges. A set back is only a failure if you give up. Any growth or goal you are working toward is never a straight line from A to B but is quite often a crooked line moving in that direction. If you are able map your goal. Keep an eye on your budget, if you start to spend more than you should or income should decline and the graph go down use that to motivate you to positive action. If you are trying to keep track of how many positive days you have with your spouse and one week you have 5 and the next week you only have 3 use that to examine the difference. Sometimes it can be circumstances you hadn’t expected or even ones beyond your control. Your car breaks down, your spouse is sick and in a bad mood. Still keep your goal firmly in mind and remember where you are heading.

HOW TO GET ANYWHERE…

“A number two pencil and a dream can take you anywhere”

This fabulous quote was given to me by a good friend who saw it on a sign at her work. At face value it seems a little pie in the sky, but is it true? In a word, absolutely. Every great dream begins with these two elements. First we need a dream, goal or whatever you care to call it. Without this step it is hard to get excited In fact without a destination in mind it is hard to get anywhere in life. I relate it to getting in your car on the passenger size, starting the ignition and putting a brick on the gas pedal. If you don’t steer and break you will either end up in someone’s back yard, or in the back of someone’s mini van. Either way effort without direction is wasted effort.

Ok, so you have a dream, now what? Can it really be realized with a simple #2 pencil? The simple answer is yes. Let me relay a personal example to you. When I began work on my book “A Happy Life for Busy People” I had a dream. That was a strong desire to bring what I have learned about living a successful and rewarding life with as many people as I could. What didn’t I have? Any idea what the hell I was doing! This can be the biggest obstacle to people achieving their dream life. It has been mine in the past. You have a great idea, but not the slightest clue as to how to accomplish it. Some see endless challenges and often quick before they really begin. I did this in years past. I would think 12 steps down the line and get so overwhelmed I wouldn’t even start step one. This is where the pencil comes in handy.

When I began work on my first book the same idea constantly came into my mind over and over again. That idea simply stated was “I have no idea how to write a book” So I began to write down everything I could think of. Every question I thought of I wrote down. “How do you get your book printed?” “What website is the best choice to use?” “Who do I know who has written a book?” Then I made lists of pros and cons of subjects. I jotted down ideas and bits of inspiration that came to me. Most of which would later only make sense to me. Considering my wonderful handwriting sometimes even that was debatable. The point being I was literally teaching myself as I went along. I wrote down the information I needed to continue. Then I would write down sources I could get that very information from. Is there a website that has that? Do I have to get a book on the subject? Is there a person I know who could advise me in this field?

I would have to say I would add one item to a dream and a pencil. That item would be a positive and expectant attitude. In reflection I fully expected and knew I was going to write a book. So when challenges arose I would just have to ask myself how can I solve this to move forward? Without this valuable tool you may be inclined to give up. If you totally expect your goal to be reached obstacles just appear as challenges to be solved and not walls stopping you.

Another important thing to realize when chasing your dreams is that chances are someone less talented, connected or gifted has accomplished the very thing you are trying to do. Even if this is not the case, consider how many people have done things others have thought impossible. So if you are considering chasing a dream grab a pencil and a great attitude and begin your journey there!

BUILDING A BONFIRE…

What does building a bonfire have to do with living an amazing life? It serves as a very good metaphor. What does it take to build a good fire? Let’s assume you were never in boys or girls scouts and we will break it down for you. You will need a safe place to do so. Making sure your fire burns only where you want it to. You will need kindling, or small pieces of wood or other flammable material that lights easy but burns quickly. You will also need successfully larger and larger pieces of wood to burn more intense and for longer periods of time. You will need to arrange these in such a way that they burn in the proper order. If you try to light the big log first, chances are your match will burn out far before the log catches fire. This brings us to our last needed element, an ignition source of some nature to start the whole thing burning.

Ok, so we have established what it takes to build a good fire, but what does this have to do with living an amazing life? Here is the answer, your motivation is much like building a fire. You will need to properly keep the fires of passion burning hot and big if you want to be able to push through obstacles toward the amazing life you reaching for. This is true of any goal or project you are working on. You will need kindling, which represents small goals that are easier to obtain as you are on your way to achieving the ultimate goal. The feeling of triumph you feel is like the burning of the kindling that will slowly start the larger logs, also known as bigger goals ablaze. You will need the right amount of this kindling. To little and your passion will fizzle long before you are able to reach your bigger goals. Just as you will need successfully larger more daring and scary goals as you get closer to your prize. You will also need an ignition source. Now many people in life, myself included, have waited for a situation to get so bad that it forces you to take action. Desperation can be a great motivator. So should we sit around waiting for our lives to fall apart so we can give ourselves a big kick in the ass to take the actions needed? Not necessarily. Another great way to motivate your self and ignite your own personal bonfire of passion is to look at what you are missing by not taking action. Grab a pen and paper and start to make a list. What will you lose or are you currently losing by not taking action? How worse off is your life being made by your procrastination? Here is a good time to be brutally honest. Trying to lose weight? How does it make you feel when you go clothes shopping and nothing fits? How does it feel when you look in the mirror? This may seem harsh but emotion is the strongest human motivator. So in addition to this ‘push’ of emotion you can double your chances of success by adding a pull. What I mean here is on another piece of paper, or the other side list how much better your life would be if you did take action. Using the above example, how good would it feel to look in the mirror and like what you see? Write it down, but even better take time to close your eyes and picture this. Really add the element of emotion. How could would it feel to get attention from a person you find attractive? If your goal was financial freedom how good would it feel to not worry about paying the bills or if your job is safe? Write it all down and picture it in your mind. Really add as much emotion as you can.

Now if you have done this all correctly you will have created an unstoppable force that will literally burn through and fear or doubt that stands in your way. Still even after you have created your bonfire of passion for success there is more work to do. Let me ask you if you have a fire going and leave it unattended what happens? Eventually you burn through all the logs you have. So the secret to keeping motivation going is to keep adding logs. Now this doesn’t mean only to keep adding new goals, although that is not a bad idea. Other logs you can add include gathering friends who both motivate you and hold you accountable. Purchasing new books or motivational CDs, taking pictures or your fitness progress or bank statements. As you continue to go towards a goal, you must continue to add logs or your fire will burn out.

WHAT’S SO HARD?

“There are three things extremely hard: steel, a diamond and to know one’s self”

-Ben Franklin

This quote from our first postmaster general has a lot of truth to it. Funny thing is one of the people we know the least is the person we see in the mirror every morning. A lot of your opinions of ourselves are generated by what others share about us. Which, since most of the people we talk to are our friends we seldom get the whole picture. So here is this weekends challenge. Make a list. On one side list everything you think is good about yourself, on the others areas you would like to improve. The goal here is to come up with more of the positive than the negative, but be honest with yourself. When you are done with that list take a look at each item on its own. How did you come to that conclusion? Did someone once tell you that you are a bad dancer? Did someone once tell you that you have a nice voice? Have you finished a few races with good times so you believe yourself to be a good runner? Does going to the gym make you a healthy person?

If you are interested in taking this a step further, contemplate on a few interesting matters. Think of where a lot of your identity comes from. A lot of us it comes from your job. When people ask me who are you? Providing they already know my name I must confess my first reaction may be to tell them my occupation. “I’m a postal worker” or “I’m an author” or even “I’m a bartender” the problem with this thinking is the state of change in today’s economy. I realized this when I was dangerously close to losing my Post Office job…the first time. I thought to myself “I’ve been working here for 13 years, it’s who I am. Now what?” This makes a job loss twice as tough. Not only do you lose your source of income, but you lose your identity. That’s why a lot of people slip into a depression after losing a job. From the outside people may say “What is the big deal? He just lost his job” In reality a lot of people fail to realize that to a lot of us that is also losing a part of our identity. Something many employers fail to recognize as well. So how did I get out of this funk? How did I protect myself in the future and how can you do the same? Great questions! That is what this site is all about. Living an amazing life. So here is something I suggest you try as soon as you can. That day I was basically told I would lose my job I went to a secluded spot in nature I go to do all my thinking. There is something about nature that seems to clear my mind. I began to think what will happen in the future. I also thought what was I like before I started to work for the postal service. I realized there was a whole other Neil I was missing. Now 13 years is a fair amount of time, but I am blessed to have several fans I have known a good deal longer than that. I called a few up and asked them what they first remember about me and basically who they thought I was. After making sure I wasn’t hitting the rum a little too hard they provided some great insight. Still other’s opinions are only part of the equation. Recently I have had the good fortune of spending a good deal of time and conversation with an amazing new person. They give me their opinions of me of course, but one of the greatest things is they stimulate me to think of things including my life and myself. Think of the people you associate with daily. Do they all tell you just what you want to hear? Are they all from the same group such as work? Do they permit you to be different without judgment or ridicule? The goal is to be with people who bring out the best in ourselves. They not only encourage us, but also are honest and accepting of ourselves. This post was quite a mouthful. But as Ben Franklin said getting to know yourself is one of the hardest things. The rewards however can save you from years of heartache and bring you lots of rewards. It is a journey well worth taking.

WHAT ARE YOU PAYING FOR?

“Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing”

-Albert Einstein

So we featured a quote from this famous physicist in yesterday’s post, but this one was a little hard to pass up. What does this exactly mean to living a rewarding life? Let us look at some of the most expensive things we spend money on and in essence what we get out of them. One of things a lot of money people spend money on are status symbols. Fancy cars, giant yachts, expensive jewelry, trips to the spa and other such items to pamper and spoil us. Why do we do these things? Well we do them for all the same reason. At first it may seem hard to believe that we will buy a sports car for the same reason we get a massage but it is true. We buy them all just to have a feeling. Whether it is one of accomplishment, importance or peace of mind they are all just feelings. Now I am a big fan of symbols and what they can bring to our lives. So I am not saying that you should not reward yourself or have things that make you feel good. By all means, use those things to motivate yourself. The important part is to understand the feelings that you are chasing with those objects. If owning that fancy car you have always dreamed of will make you feel like you have truly accomplished something in your life that by that car. Notice though that feeling doesn’t strike when you turn the keys for the first time or even when you sign the title. No the feeling usually comes over you on the way to the dealership when you know the car is yours and that you are now the proud owner of a feeling of accomplishment as well as a pretty hot ride. Notice you cannot have the car without first having the feeling. So I say while chasing the dream of the car, the new house, the unicorn whatever it is you are chasing chase that feeling as well. After all it is not the object that is why you have accomplished something. A lottery winner could buy ten of them and all they have accomplished was buying the right ticket. No, practice celebrating the feeling daily when you can. If you celebrate your small accomplishments soon they will lead to even greater ones and before you know it you will be picking me up in your new car to celebrate!

GIVE IT UP!!

Why on earth in a blog about living a more rewarding life and persevering would you find a title like this? Yesterday we discussed Fat Tuesday and self-indulgence. Today we are going to look at Ash Wednesday. This is a Christian holiday that represents the start of lent. A period of fasting leading up to Easter. Whether or not you are Christian stay with me here. In a nutshell Ash Wednesday people give up something as a sign of sacrifice for their beliefs. Whether your beliefs are Christian, Buddhist, Muslim or you just believe in trying to create a better you and a better world, we can all be a part of this holiday. Now I have heard a large range of things people give up for lent. Sugary foods, coffee, alcohol, or even just the traditional meat on Fridays. I suggest we can take this a step further. Let us find something that pushes us to improve not just sacrifice. Try giving up listening to that negative voice in the back of your head. Give up junk food? How about giving up bad eating and try to take better care of the bodies we have been blessed with. How about trying to stay away from gossip? Try giving up saying anything negative about anyone including yourself? Traditionally lent last 40 days. Scientists say it takes anywhere from 21-30 days to create a new habit. So you will be well on your way even if you mess up once or twice. Perhaps we could spend today thinking of what we could ‘give up’ from our lives that would end up serving us and making our world a little better in the process. Whatever idea you come up with I suggest writing it down and taping it to your computer screen at work or your bathroom mirror. Somewhere you will receive a subtle reminder of what you are giving up from your life. If you mess up, just dust yourself off and get back on track. Then we can all celebrate together on Easter whether we are Christian or not. We will all have improved and rid our lives of something we are better off without.

LET US NOT SOLVE ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS!!

Again I would like to remind you that Living a positive rewarding life is not a goal, but a path to set on. Just as the goal is not to solve all of your challenges. Although that sounds very appealing and can be realistic for a very brief moment in time, it actually is not our end here. Sure a life free of problems sounds like a great idea anytime, especially Monday mornings right? There is two major problems with this way of thinking. First, challenges add excitement to our lives. you are probably thinking “Neil that is some excitement I could do without.” The purpose of this blog is not to eliminate those stressors from your life, but show you how to overcome them and use them as opportunities to grow. Let’s face it with out a challenge how would we ever feel like we accomplished anything? Anytime we feel a sense of accomplishment whether it be winning a game, building a car from scratch, solving the family budget or landing that dream job, it all began with a challenge. Sure playing a game may be fun and involve a little luck, but when you begin the challenge is to work within the parameters of the rules to accomplish the goal of winning. Your opponents are your adversaries, even though they might just be friends and family. Even if you do not win the game, but you give it your best shot you can still leave feeling like a winner. How many times have we heard athletes say “We left it all on the field” or “We played our best game” even if they lost they are often more happy than teams who win while playing bad. Life is not much different. When we are looking to land a new job we must do several things on our half. We must work on our resume, updating our skills, practice our interviewing skills, maybe research the company we are applying at. If we do all of these steps and are still not chosen for the job we may feel disappointed with the situation, but we can know that we gave it our best shot and often may be more inclined to think of ways in which we can improve for next time. So take a good look at your problems. Do you have some that seem to come up over and over? Do several of your problems seem to have something in common? It is time to use your problems instead of letting your problems use you.

WHAT IS THE MEANING OF LIFE?

So what is the meaning of life? Today we are going to investigate and answer that very question. You mean you will not have to climb to the top of some very tall mountain and ask a very old man with a long beard? No actually all you have to do is log on, click on this blog and read the writings of a man who feels old and only has a goatee. OK, I don’t know many of you. Some of you I only know fairly well. Even the ones I know very well how can I begin to tell you the meaning of your life? How if we have never met can I begin to tell you what the purpose of you being here is? Well let me begin by paraphrasing another man with a great name, Neal Donald Walsh, even though he may have his spelling all wrong I believe his thinking is all right. He said in the famous movie The Secret and again I’m doing this from my memory which can be suspect at times. He said there is no blackboard in the sky where God writes “Your purpose in life is ____” A lot of us would like to believe we are all preordained with some divine purpose and as soon as it is revealed our life will be easy and our path will be laid out before us. Sad thing is some people spend their entire lives looking for this writing in the sky. I’m here to tell you something very important – your mission in life is what you choose to make it – True you may have some divine inspiration along the way. We are all given some talents with which to work and things we excel at. We are all driven by different motivations. Martin Luther King jr. was angered by the injustice he saw to a point he decided his life mission was to strive for equality. Mother Theresa was saddened by all the people she saw who needed help that were being left behind so she dedicated her life to helping the poor and forgotten. Musicians see how their music can touch people so they try to spread that feeling to as many people as possible. I was disgusted by how much negativity is in the world so I decided to make my life’s mission to bring more positivity to the world. I am still trying to work out what Paris Hilton’s mission is, perhaps she is still searching. The point here is that your mission, your meaning of life is whatever you decide it is. What are you passionate about? If you noticed in the examples above the passion does not necessarily have to be a positive one to make for a great life mission. So if you find yourself feeling lost, wondering why you are here. My suggestion? Decide why you are here. Spend the weekend examining things you have a great deal of feeling for. Then decide what life means to you. Who knows your life’s mission may change several times in your life as you learn and grow. The main thing here is to understand you are the one who decides what life means to you. So ask yourself this weekend “what is the meaning of life” you can even try climbing the highest hill you can find to think about it. If you grow a beard while thinking you may have spent too much time on the question.

BECOME, DO NOT JUST ACCOMPLISH

As 2014 begins a lot of us begin to lay out a few ‘new years resolutions’ a set of goals which we hope to accomplish in the coming year. Goals are important to be sure. They give us a point to aim for and direction to head. Still most of our resolutions fall flat and gyms that were full in January and February are empty by March and April. Why does this happen? Why do we give up on our goals so quickly? I think the answer is two-fold. First, a lot of our goals both at New Years and throughout the year are more about what we wish to accomplish. I can imagine you scratching your head asking “Isn’t that what goals are supposed to be about?” Well, yes and no. If your only focus is on accomplishing something say losing 20 pounds, it is outside of us. We are not very attached to it. Those 20 pounds are something separate from us. True, we only are wishing they were separate from us, but there is not emotional investment in something to accomplish. So how can we become someone who sticks to their resolutions and improves on who they were last year? The first step is to change accomplishing something to becoming more. Take the weight loss example. What seems like a more powerful goal, to lose 20 pounds or to become a healthier and more physically fit person? You could lose weight by starving yourself or taking some unhealthy weight loss pill, but is that really improving? So how do we stick to our goals of wanting to become more? Add a why. Most people have a goal, but there is no passion behind it. The easiest way to establish that is to decide why we want that goal. If your goal is to become a more physically fit person list why. Perhaps it is to be able to keep up with your children or even be around for them longer. Perhaps there was a painful situation that being out of shape caused, write that down! Pain can be a very powerful motivator if we use it properly. So write a list of what you wish to become in your life, then below each goal write several whys. The more powerful the better. Then as you start to stray from your commitment review that list. Remembering why you want to do something can be for more powerful than just remembering you want to do it. Try to remain positive about your goals and picture how life will be better when they are accomplished. That will make the goals your friends not your enemy. Any other ideas for sticking to your goals? Please feel free to share with the rest of us!

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