Perspectives on gratitude in difficult times
November 28, 2008
As you move forward from your Thanksgiving holiday, I wanted to let you know that I am grateful for your interest in the information I provide about how you can ‘get out of your own way’. And I am so thankful to hear your successes from applying them. I have SO much more useful information I have been wanting to share with you on creating the success you deserve, increasing your belief in yourself, and creating more health in yourself so I hope you will continue your interest and support.
We all know to be grateful, yet I also hear how that can be challenging in the midst of a rapidly changing world that seems like it is changing for the worse. I have been seeking out perspectives on this challenge for myself and for you my subscribers. So, today I am down in the Caribbean island of Anguilla enjoying some time with my family (and thankful for that!) when I had this spontaneous idea to share with you some of the perspectives I have been getting from my spiritual advisors that I have musing on and finding helpful. For what its worth here are some ideas I have been trying to apply, I share them in the hope they might be helpful for you in some ways as well.
1) Problems are often solutions for ‘bigger problems’, i.e. your current problem can be considered “warning opportunities” to prevent “bigger future problems.” The most helpful use of your efforts is to try to figure out what the “bigger problem” is and work directly to find solutions to it so that you can prevent that really big problem down the line. For example, if things are not going well with a particular client or your assistant, it may be a sign of a ‘bigger, more ongoing problem’, i.e., that you are not an influential communicator and don’t know how to manage people’s expectations, that you don’t know how to ‘read’ other people well enough to find the right fit with others, or that you don’t have systems set up which facilitate how to work with people and then others get annoyed because they don’t know how to work with you, etc etc. Any of these things could be considered more longstanding “problems” that if not “fixed” will lead you to fall short of the ultimate success you deserve over time.
For another example, if you are having a problem with debt, unless it was intentionally taken on in the service of financing a new business or incurred because of unexpected medical condition, etc. then that debt is indicative of a ‘bigger problem’ of how you are living your life. Your opportunity is to pay more attention to articulating your priorities, examine more your motives for spending money and seeing if there is an opportunity to ‘fill’ yourself in ways that will be ultimately more fulfilling, learn more about how to plan things ahead of time and delay gratification, etc etc– The idea there is that if money fell in your lap to pay off your debts like you probably pray for, you might be deprived of learning these lessons that will help you live a better life overall in the long term. “Be grateful for your problems” now, see them as valuable information and prevent the real and “bigger problem” down the line. 2) No matter how much we currently lack or have lost, we probably still have so much more than most people in the world. There are some things that are probably obvious to be grateful for, like the members of your family, your health (and if you have aspects of challenged health right now, then all the other aspects of your health that are functioning well and all the medical care you might be recieving to move you more towards health). There are also many things it may be easy to overlook, like having a home to live in, heat and lighting and furniture and appliances that work etc in that home, financial advisors to help you figure out future planning, access to information at any moment that can help you improve your life in whatever way you want, transportation to anywhere anytime to commune with people and have access to money making activities, freedoms and rights to be speak and pursue entrepreneurial efforts and worship and express yourself the way you deeply want to, etc etc. Really encourage yourself to always keep in mind this perspective, to be “thankful” for the nature of the current problems you do have and that you don’t have to experience even more profound problems as others might now.
3) We are experiencing a “shift” from goals of material wealth to those of “spiritual wealth”. I have been listening to my spiritual mentors who suggest that for the next few years we are undergoing a shift from an Age which was ruled by our intellect, and had primary goals of amassing material wealth. And that we are heading into a new Age which will be “ruled by the heart”, with our “intellect in the service of our hearts”. In the upcoming times, true wealth will be considered a connection to one’s sense of purpose, a connection to others, and reaping the collective benefits of actions in the service of a greater good. The implication: Anyone who cultivates these kinds of approaches to life will already be “ahead” of the curve and is poised for a lot of success in the new era.
I was just realizing that I actually wrote an article on this last point a year ago, its entitled “How your heart can make you more money than your mind”. Here it is if you would like to read it:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
In gratitude to be connected to you,
Sharon
P.S. Please add your comments below, I and my other subscribers would love to hear what you have to say.
From Chaos To Control
November 21, 2008
Have you been using time management techniques but still you feel overwhelmed, unfocused, and not getting it all done? Here’s why time management techniques may not have worked for you:
Time management techniques are essential tools - they tell you how to make your schedule, what activities to do to organize your time, etc — but the problem is that they are only as good as the person using them. (that would be you!)
Stephen Covey said it best: “Time management is a misnomer–the real challenge is to manage ourselves”.
Time management techniques assume that you can manage yourself well in order for them to work. Take a gut check for a moment, how well do you manage yourself?
Here are 3 examples to see if you relate:
1) You have a new idea you want to send out in an email to your clients, and you block out from 4-5pm this afternoon to do it. Excellent time management technique. When 4pm rolls around: you think to yourself: What will my clients think of this email, what if they don’t respond? What if they think it’s a stupid idea? Do I really know enough to write about this idea, maybe I better go find out more on the internet, etc. The way you manage yourself, not what you have written in your schedule, that will determine whether you procrastinate in that moment or not.
2) You schedule 30 minute blocks of time to check your email. First time you check your email you get an email from your boss asking to check in with you about progress on your high visibility project for him. What’s your reaction? Do you go into a panic, wondering whether you have done “enough”, worried what your boss will think of you? Do you lose 10-15 minutes obsessing about it? If so, you’ve now thrown off your 30 minutes to answer emails.
3) You had an awkward interaction with a client this morning. You have date night with your spouse tonight, but the whole time you end up talking through this difficult interaction: worrying what the client will think, whether they will still do business with you, etc. You scheduled the time with your spouse but you are not present it. Nor did you schedule in the 20 minutes you will probably stress about it before you fall asleep.
The idea is that time management is a two part process: how you schedule your time outside of you, and how you manage yourself inside of you. One without the other will not give you focus, productivity, and the balance you want.
The takeaway: Instead of focusing on “managing your time”, focus on cleaning up the time you waste that is not accounted for by your time management systems.
My upcoming teleconference program “From Chaos to Control” guarantees you will end your wasting time and free up 5 hours of time to spend on work or play each week. I will mentor you to manage yourself effectively so you can stop your wasting time. It starts December 2nd, don’t let the end of the year come without you getting done the things that will secure your financial future. Learn more at www.endwastedtime.com/
Have Five More Hours Free-Time Without Changing Your Schedule
August 12, 2008
You tend to focus on how you ’spend’ your time. Time is your most precious non- renewable resource. It is an investable asset. Books and courses tell you how to apportion the quantity of your time among different activities in order to have the return on your investment of more success and happiness. Yet it is the quality of your experience rather than the quantity that will in large part determine your ultimate happiness and sense of accomplishment.
Its really even more than just your ‘time,’ because time is interwoven with what you devote your energy and attention to. I call time, energy, and attention collectively your “TEA”. Each day whether you are conscious of it or not, you are pouring out TEA. Question is: are you pouring it right into the cups of the things you want to experience, so you can metaphorically have something to drink in that nourishes you, gives back to you, fills you up? Or are you spilling your TEA throughout the day, so that at the end of the day the cups of what you really want for your life remain half filled (and to boot, you have a mess on your hands that you have to clean up - that will cost you some more time!)
Many clients report that they ’spill TEA’ obsessing about what their boss thinks about them, replaying incidents that happened and wondering ‘what they did wrong’, and feeling frustrated wondering why a difficult person in their life acts the way they do . You may not have connected the dots, but your confidence level significantly affects how much TEA you spill. When you have confidence in yourself, you are less apt to spend time trying to figure other people out because you feel right about your own actions. When you feel confident, you look within to know ‘how am I doing’, rather than obsessing about how others view you. As you develop the ability to deal with yourself better, you are able to curtail the TEA you spill each day.
For example, a woman in my recent 8 week Comfort Zone to Confidence Zone program said that she shaved off about 5 hours of week of spilling TEA and now devotes that time to her new relationship and time with her ailing Mother. She has to write reports as part of her work consulting for clients. Though quite seasoned in her field with a good track record of successes, for a long time she has felt she wasn’t ’smart enough’. So whenever she would have to write something she would obsess and edit it over and over. She would procrastinate, routinely ask colleagues to give feedback, and review competitors’ work to determine if her work was ‘good enough’.
Midway through the Confidence Zone course she moved beyond her longstanding doubts and built a significant degree of confidence — so she no longer had to do the behaviors that took up so much of her time, energy, and attention. When I asked her about how much less TEA she was spilling she said “A lot!”, and when I asked her how many hours a week she had freed up, she said “about 5″.
Are you are ready to stop stressing yourself out in order to free up more time in your life? Are you ready to reach the goals that will enable you to finally feel ‘enough’ within 8 weeks? Then join my Comfort Zone to Confidence Zone course in NYC beginning September 30. Learn more
If you have not heard me speak before and want a preview of the course, sign up for my free presentation September 15th in NYC. Sign up for the preview here.
End Wasted Time
Stop Your Time Wasting – FOREVER – so you can have the focus to secure your financial success and get back the free time you work so hard for. Find out more!Free Audio Training
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