Bucket lists for life . . . and business

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How about writing a Bucket List for your life,  and having one for your business too?

The concept of Bucket Lists is more familiar when we speak about our lives. It is not uncommon for us to think or say ‘that’s something I want to do in this lifetime’.   The joy of having a Bucket List is that it constantly keeps us focused on what we want  for our lives, and by consequence, brings us ever closer to living this life.

From a Life perspective, rather than having the classic (and somewhat obvious) inclusions of things like Sky Diving and having sex on an aeroplane, I’d add to love more deeply than I had imagined possible, to contribute more greatly than I had dreamed I would be able to,  to have better friends than I believe I deserve, to always try to leave more than I take, to always live connected to source, to see the world in its infinite beauty, with more to be added. 

What does your Life Bucket List include?

Then, how about producing a Bucket List for your company, or your professional life too? Seen as we spend most of our lives working, it may as well be a great part of our lives.  Perhaps this Bucket List could include items like taking the business international, adding a new product line, buying another business, earning a certain amount a year, firing your boss, selling the business for a certain price.  The Business Bucket List is certainly different from the Life list, but is no less significant in terms of what we want to achieve in this lifetime.

The great thing about a Bucket List is that by the nature of it, it need not be done this year.  When we commit to New Year’s resolutions, we are resolving that that thing will be done within the next 12 months.  An item on a Bucket List allows us the freedom to choose when to take action.  Perhaps the danger of a Bucket List is that it remains just a list because it is not as yet attached to any definitive timing.  It may therefore be useful to take one or two items on your Bucket List and resolve to do them each year.  It’s always a coaching outcome that you find a way to hold yourself accountable for achievement, so add that self-commitment in.  

The real benefit of a Bucket List is that it really focuses us on what we want for and in our lives.  It gives us the opportunity to dream.  I believe that if you can dream it, you can live it, but it obviously takes effort to bring these dreams into manifestation. 

 

Responsibility = the ability to respond

 

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I was listening to a coaching webcast this morning on the subject of parenting where an amazing concept was presented: responsiblity is the ability to respond. 

Because the way that we respond falls within our scope of influence, it is our choice as to how we behave.  It is useful to reflect on our behaviour and identify where we can improve in future.

How many of us actually respond?

Most of us are on automatic pilot most of the time.  I certainly was when I was in the corporate world and as a result, I allowed myself to react almost all the time.  The preference would have been to work out what my triggers were, and then prepare better responses than the autopilot was delivering. 

Are you in the same position now?

What causes the triggers to fire? 

The first part in the process is to identify what causes your triggers to give you an automatic response?  In my case, I was dog tired most (all) of the time, and didn’t have the capacity to perform this reflection.  Perhaps I was also running some of the programming from my upbringing.   What are your triggers and when do they surface?

Work out your ‘pause’

When we have time to contemplate our reaction, that moves us from a place of reacting to a place of responding.  It is useful to have a predetermined manner in which to take the time needed to process.  This allows us to  develop an appropriate response which is in keeping with your ideal picture of yourself. 

Perhaps it is counting to ten?  Perhaps it is remembering to breathe, and doing so deeply three times?  Perhaps it is finding a happy place to go to to find peace?  Whatever it is, its important to have a pre-planned way to deal with things that would ordinarily send you straight back into auto-react. 

Design your response 

What is the ideal response? If your normal reaction was to yell, and this is no longer what you wish for yourself, then what response do you wish to put forward now?   

Being accountable to yourself 

Coaching is always about you are  accoutable to yourself for your own actions. So, how will you be accountable to yourself in ensuring that you use your planned response rather than your old reaction in future?  Remember also to acknowledge yourself when you do take this step forward in future. 

Share your learning

We’d all love to hear about your experiences in using your ability to respond, verus running the old programme of reacting, so do share your successes by leaving a comment.

 

 

Networking is not about who you know . . .

. . . . It’s about who knows you. 

Word of mouse is the new way of networking

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Until recently, if someone had asked me what I thought networking was, I would have answered that it was the number of people I knew.  Basically, who was in my network. 

All that changed when I realised that networking is in fact who knows you and whether you are top of mind when a need arises that your skill set fulfills.  It’s about whether your name comes up as the best alternative when people are looking for that position, that management style, that service, or even that friend.

There is much talk about how networking has changed from face to face interactions into web-based communications.  Sites like Facebook, Twitter Linked-In, MyGenius, MeetUp and others are revolutionising how we connect and with whom. 

There are specific courses on offer around the globe teaching us how to use these sites for business purposes.  Although Twitter is perceived as primarily a business site, Facebook was perceived as a social networking site.  Many of the available courses teach how to transform Facebook into a highly successful and ROI-driven business tool

These sites are allowing our contacts to become increasingly global.  Business is no longer bound by country boundaries, and contacts therefore must be developed and nurtured across countries and continents.

Take a moment to review what your network looks like, and if you are the ‘go to’ person within this circle.  If not, perhaps it’s worth considering what action you need to take and whether you need to invest more time in the art of global networking.

Laughter is the best medicine

I was recently reminded about Normal Cousins’ experiments with laughter, and specifically his presentation of the fact that laughter is the best medicine.  He claimed that around ten minutes of good ‘belly laughing’ would keep him pain-free for about 2 hours.   Most of us have to pop a pill to enjoy the same results.

We spend most of our waking life at the office, so why should it not be a place that we truly enjoy?  If laughter really delivers the fantastic results that Norman Cousins’ suggested, then introducing laughter into our lives regularly is a necessity.  Perhaps our health even depends on it?

Much of what goes on in business requires a focused mind, and often, a healthy dose of creativity.  Developing a winning strategy, writing a proposal, drafting an agreement or any similar undertaking is surely better undertaken when the mind is quiet, focused, alert, alive rather than being focused on what’s wrong in the world, business, life.

If you have children, observe how readily and how often they burst into laughter.  Also, it is not the polite laughter of adults but rather the real belly laugher that Norman Cousins talks about. 

As adults, we seem to have forgotten the joy of living a life with humour as a major participant.  While it is very easy to laugh at something like a comedy clip, it is probably doubly rewarding to have the ability to laugh at yourself.  This not only means that you are not taking yourself too seriously, but also that you are living life with a great perspective.

There is always more than enough going on in the world to depress us.  This is not about ignoring the reality of life, but rather taking a few minutes each day, or even each hour if you need it, and laughing – really, truly, deeply laughing!

So, my coaching challenge to you is to laugh every day,  just after you awaken, as this will set the tone for the day ahead.  Whether this entails playing with your kids, your pets, your partner (smile) or watching something humourous on YouTube, make a pact to do it. And, do it as often as you need to during the day to retain a playful state of mind and body.

I invite you to keep a rating of your days so that you can see if there is a difference in the quality of your days when you undertake this practice.  I’m sure there will be.

I wish you much laughter on your journey!

 

 

 

The importance of quiet time

This morning I was listening to a recording of the October Spiritual Coaching Teleclass, led by my most favourite facilitator, Alan Seale.  These are free teleclasses, offered by the International Coach Academy, and anyone can join in. 

During the call, I was reflecting on how important quiet time is, not only in terms of a spiritual practice, but in terms of a life and business practice.

In Business Coaching, we often ask clients to reflect on how much time they are spending in their business, rather than on their business.  When you’re in your business, its all about doing.  When you’re on your business, it’s all about thinking.  This requires some quiet time to allow the mind some space to be creative.

The same is true for life as a whole.  We often get so caught up in the doing that we forget about the thinking.  As Tony Robbins would say, as a result, we forget to design our lives.  We don’t take and make the time to identify if our current actions, in both life and business, are going to get us to our end-goals.  Quiet time permits this reflection.

The questions for this week are:  How much quiet time do you permit yourself in each week, and even in each day of the week?  How much of your time is spent on the doing versus the thinking?  Does this equation need to be balanced in your life and/or business?

Take a quiet moment to reflect.

From www.freedigitialphotos.net. The outside always reflects what's happening on the inside

 

 

Do what you like least, first

There is a lot to be said for prioritising the activities that you like least.

The first reason for doing this is that unless you prioritise the things you like to do least, these things will quite simply not get done.  That is until they become important or even emergencies. 

The second thing is that when you delay taking an action that you really don’t want to take, the thought of taking that action hangs over your head for the entire day or for however long you delay taking the action.  Just the thought of having to take this action makes the rest of our experience go to hell.  Often, taking the action is not as bad as we had anticipated (though granted, sometimes it is).  The longer one delays the action, the more we seem to build it up in our minds as something bigger than it is.

Taking the action offers us the prime benefit of knowing that we can push through difficult circumstances.  This, supported by the fact that the experience is often not as bad as we anticipated, helps us gather momentum to tackle even bigger challenges that perhaps we haven’t faced as yet.

The problem with having to handle something is that it needs to be handled.  The longer it is left undone, the more undone it becomes.  It is not worth allowing your stress levels to climb and your outlook to suffer because of something that may or may not be.

The best approach is to tackle the challenge, the second it arises.  Don’t allow these things to gather more negative energy than they already have.  Get the negativity over and done with, releasing yourself to enjoy your day and appreciate the journey for what it is.

 

 

 

 

 

Goal setting; creating certainty in uncertain times

Welcome to The Journey Coach blog.

Can you believe that it’s February already?  That means that we are around 15% of the way through 2009.   I’m sure many people are wishing  this year away, particularly as the global economic news keeps worsening.  More and more jobs are being cut, news of economic contractions keep coming, so economically, there hasn’t been much good news this year.  This seems unlikely to change in the near future.

Although this may seem an unusual recommendation given these turbulent times, sitting down and setting goals for 2009 may be the most important step to take.  There have been many studies which have highlighted how significant it is to develop written goals and to focus on the achievement of these goals consistently.  (This is one of the reasons why coaching adds much to goal achievement; it is the constant focus that the coaching process provides that contributes to its success.)  In tough economic times, there has never been a more important need to set a direction, and to commit to achieving that direction, come what may.

It’s the ‘come what may’ part that many people (or businesses) are afraid of.  It’s the psychology of “I won’t commit to this, just in case something changes that throws me off balance.” It is certainly possible (even probable) in uncertain times that something may crop up that does cause you to wobble.  Commitment means finding a way, even if it means finding a way that you didn’t expect to have to find.  It’s really the approach that makes or breaks the action.  Believing that you are going to fail ensures this outcome.  Knowing that you are going to succeed, no matter what, ensures this outcome. 

I encourage everyone to take the time to sit down and commit to where you want to be in a month, a year, five years and longer, no matter what.  I can guarantee you that your character will be much stronger as a result of this commitment and the process of achievement of whatever goals you have set. Making use of a coach in this process is ideal, because the coach will help you to remain accountable to yourself and remind you to celebrate the big milestones that you achieve.

Getting direction and following that direction, no matter what, is the best way to create certainty in uncertain times.  Commit now.