Seven Ways To Raise Your Standards

 

Here’s my take on some common ways that we can raise our standards:

1. By  not allowing ourselves to be treated badly by other people
2. Having only useful or beautiful objects in our homes
3. Doing  the daily work on our goals
4. By not listening to the fearful voices inside our heads
5. Keeping a tidy home – if we can tidy it for visitors, then surely we can give ourselves the respect of keeping it tidy always.
6. By not allowing negative people and talk in our lives
7. By only wearing clothing that is a true reflection of our personalities – nothing dull, ugly or scruffy

By raising our standards we restore our self respect and attract better opportunities into our lives, otherwise we’re stuck with the same-old same-old.  In the words of Henry Ford “If you do the things you’ve always done, you’ll  always get what you’ve always got”  Right on Henry.

 

The Joy of Mindless Pursuits…or How I Get My Best Ideas.

I get it now.  Trainspotting.  Men in anoraks standing on cold railway platforms in the UK.  Its a kind of mindless pursuit, and its very easy to laugh.  But, I believe, everyone needs a mindless pursuit and there’s a lot of more conventional pursuits that could be considered mindless.  Many of us turn to fishing, knitting  or Sudoku when we are stressed.   Gambling in any form.  Baking anyone?   It’s no coincidence that the image at the top of this post is of wool and needles.   Knitting would have to be top of the list of my own mindless pursuits.

The beauty of a mindless pursuit is just  that.  It’s mindless.  The brain  is effectively switched off, out to lunch,  feet up and wine in hand.  Bliss……

So what are the requirements for a mindless pursuit?

I would argue that there are four essentials – Solitude, Silence, Repetition and Time.  Combine these four and there’s a potential for some free flowing brain action, and this is where the ideas come from.   Solitude and silence because the brain to go into autopilot mode, which it can’t do when we’re  busy multi-tasking.  Time because we need to “settle in” to whichever is our go-to activity, and repetition because this is what  helps the mind float free.  The body is busy, and because the activity is repetitive the mind doesn’t need to work hard to control it.  It’s almost like a moving meditation.

Ok, so what’s the big deal here?  Why bother?  Because, for me anyway, this is when the ideas arrive,  sometimes thick and fast. They may  be hopeless, but odds are that somewhere among the mess will be a gem.  And that’s the beauty of it.  Trainspotting anyone?

Your Environment Matters

Friedensreich Hundertwasser is one of my favourite artists. His work is organic, colourful, quirky and original and a direct response to the grey linearity of his home city of Vienna. Apart from making some revolutionary paintings and buildings, including some very fine public toilets at KawaKawa New Zealand, he was quite the thinker.  His architectural work arose from his theory of the five skins which surround a human being.  These are:

1. Epidermis
2. Clothing
3. Housing
4. Identity
5. Planet Earth

As you can see each level corresponds to a wider environment around us.  Hundertwasser knew that our personal environments matter, each and every one of them from the nearest and most personal, the skin on our bodies, to the widest of all, our planet, and each affects us in a very different but equally critical way.

If  we want to do good work, as an artist, creator or entrepreneur these things need to be sympathetic for us as individuals, especially the first four.  At different times of our lives each layer may also  take on a different level of importance.  As teenagers our clothing is often  a priority, but later in life  our focus may become wider and we may be more fixed on planetary concerns.

We need to feel comfortable in our own skin to be able to express our unique ideas well.   Are we in good health so that we can go about our day to day business without any hindrances?  On any particular day do we need to feel relaxed, powerful, funny, creative?  – our clothing should reflect this.   Our housing must be appropriate to our needs, spacious, cozy, stimulating, serene, to allow us to express our creativity.  Our relationships with those about us – do they nurture and support us or are they damaging?  And lastly are we nurturing and supporting our planet to allow it to provide us with the natural environments we so desperately need?

For me personally this means my environment must be nurturing.  I need to feel calm, ordered and serene.  I need my environment to be beautiful.  To look out on a busy city street would be a kind of death for me, I need to see trees, mountains and birds, so skins number three and five are crucial. Skin number two, clothing definitely needs more work and doesn’t express the real me, but I’m working on it.

Where I’m going with this post is that we all need to take responsibility for our personal environments, our five skins, so that we can make the most of our time here on earth.  So that we can create, make, invent, explore and adventure ourselves into the fullest expressions of ourselves.  So that we can add our contributions towards the betterment of humanity and so that ultimately we can leave our world better for us having been here.

 

2017: New Year New You – how to live with happiness and #heart

So, it’s New Year and the internet will be full of posts about New Year New You.  Gym owners will be rubbing their hands in glee because they’ll be making a year’s rent in the next month out of year long memberships used for one week in a flurry of New Year guilt.  Here in the Southern Hemisphere  we have the luxury of summer holidays coinciding with the New Year period.  Long sunny days beside the beach/river in which to dream and plot about the forthcoming year…..

Since I’ve finally figured out that my One Word is #heart it’s made the process a whole lot easier.  This year I will filter every decision past #heart.  This year I figure that if  I make 80% of my decisions from the heart I will be doing well.  In fact it should make for a very happy year and I can’t ask for more than that.

I’ve deliberately set vague goals – every time I get specific something weird happens in the Universe (technical phrase there…..) and the gremlins get in –  which happens so frequently  it’s uncanny.  Goals just aren’t working for me.  For 2017 I’m setting intentions instead.  My intentions are to grow my online audience, increase my cashflow and improve my health.  And that’s it.  Easy.  Or not – do I hear the gremlins sniggering in the background??  Any improvements at the end of the year I’ll take as a win.  And of course all of these intentions will come from my #heart.

I’ve learned something from long walks in the hills – one of my favourite things to do.    If I set out with a gentle intention of going for a walk, rather than roaring off to get “exercise” the momentum gently builds and I go far longer and faster than I originally intended.  I don’t need to thrash myself to get there I just need to relax and walk and enjoy.

So, in that spirit, here’s my advice (and what I’m doing this year):

•  Don’t set goals, set some intentions which are important to you and come from your heart.  You’ll know them when you find them – they’ll resonate with you.
• Pick two or three that are the most important to you and deliberately make them vague (hence achievable!)  Don’t get too strung up on lists and targets.  Just know where you want to head and aim for it.
• If you take the long view and assess at year end any course correction appears as minor in the grand scheme of things.
•  Don’t forget to regularly check on your intentions.  I’m sticking mine to my laptop keyboard where I’ll be constantly reminded.
• On 1 January 2018 pat yourself on the back for all the things you DID achieve.  And yes you survived another year!

 

What I’m reading: Your One Word by Evan Carmichael

Good grief, it’s been a while.   I’ve been doing a bunch of reading and thinking but not a lot of writing.  Obviously.    And lots and lots of knitting.  In among all that knitting reading and thinking I’ve read Evan Carmichael’s new book “Your One Word”.   Evan Carmichael is a social media influencer in the sphere of entrepreneurship.

The premise of this book is that we all have one essential concept which shapes our lives and provides the driving force and motivation for our life choices.  This concept can be expressed as a single word and the reader is taken through a series of exercises designed to elucidate it.  The idea is that once one’s word is discovered, this can be consciously applied to clarify options when making decisions around life choices.  A sort of values based filter, or guiding star.

Whilst this could be considered an overly simplistic approach, it actually works,  and having gone through the process it’s become obvious that  my one word is #heart.    I’ve been  struggling lately  to put my finger on exactly what message I wanted communicate with this blog  – what theme actually linked together all of my interests.  Originally it  was intended to be about travel, specifically my travels, but it’s been morphing lately to encompass a number of subjects,  Interestingly, now that I’ve figured out #heart a lot of things have fallen rather neatly into place.   It’s certainly given me a lot more clarity when making decisions.

What #heart means to me is:

• Trust my intuition – all my best decisions, the ones that have worked out (often unexpectedly) for the best have been those I’ve made with my heart.
• Get quiet – sometimes my heart speaks in whispers
• Be courageous – have a big bold gutsy heart – explore, do scary things
• Act from a place of love – be passionate about what I’m currently doing

To me #heart and the heart symbol are not some safe sappy feel good options.  Its about having the guts to make hard decisions, about speaking up when it’s unpopular and about being true to myself.   It’s about using the strongest force in the Universe – Love –  to create a greener, kinder, gentler world, because we surely do need it right now.  This is not, yet another New Year Resolution which will be forgotten after a month.  This stuff lights up my soul.

So can I recommend this book?   Hell yeah.

 

 

 

 

Adios Andalucia

I miss you already!  I miss the sun on the Med.  I miss the 3€ wine.  I miss the flowers in the campo; the cork oaks, the olive trees.  I miss the pigs on the hill, the owl in the cork tree and Fluff the dog downstairs.   I miss the drive down the hill, the “Curvas Peligrosas” (which arent) the cars parked in the middle of roundabouts and the beat up Renault vans.  I miss tapas and 1€ ham.  I miss the lucky-lucky man from Senegal, Niki at Plaza Bistro, everyone at Cross fit Elviria,  the lady who begs outside the supermarket, all the old Spanish guys with hats and walking sticks and I even miss grumpy Lorena the checkout chick at SuperSol.   So maybe it’s not Adios at all.  Just a luego Andalucia…

Surprising Dubai

Before I came to Dubai I’d  imagined it to be all glitz and fast cars (of which there an inordinate amount admittedly) and shopping malls.  But there are inklings of the way Dubai was 50 years ago.  The Dubai you see today has been created in that time mainly by the vision and drive of its ruler Sheikh Mohammed.
Surprisingly Dubai has no oil reserves so the local economy is very much based on trade and tourism.
Parts of Dubai are surprisingly green and so long as plants are watered they grow like mad despite the sand, due to  the high number of sunshine hours.  Areas  such as Arabian Ranches where we stayed are bordering on lush.  And yes they really do have penguins at the aquarium.
Dubai is great.  It’s the best place imaginable for people watching as every nationality in the world is represented here and they all visit the malls.  All you need do is stop for a coffee and you’re entertained for hours. There’s a lot more to Dubai than shopping and I’d definitely come back.  It was brilliant.    A big thanks to Sue for her hospitality and Hameed for a great day at Hatta.

Leaving

So here we are on the big adventure waiting at Sydney airport to depart for Dubai.   Despite this being our big adventure I feel incredibly poignant about leaving all our wonderful friends.   Big thanks to Claire, Kay and Roger, Lizzie and John, Murray and Sandra and everyone else who put in epic efforts to help us get away after Jeff hurt his back.   Your help was much appreciated.   Wish that I could take you all with me.   And finally in memory of Ron who passed away last night.  Too young.   Which is why we’re grabbing life with both hands now.