Posts Tagged ‘Peace’

There will never be peace on Earth. Never! Not as long as humans put themselves in charge of the rightness and wrongness; the goodness and the badness, prosperity and poverty. Nope: It ain’t gonna happen!

Peace will come when we give up doing unto ourselves and others what is hurtful, harmful and destructive. I drink coffee and alcohol, use sugar and eat meat and wheat – all of which are destructive to my system. I use electronics, drive a fossil fueled vehicle and count on many of those organizations who contribute to destruction of the planet, to keep me safe and provide electricity, etc for my comfort. Like the majority of individuals on the planet, 70% of my thoughts are negative. This also contributes to an internal environment that is not peace-full; it is actually dis-eased. I’ve been in relationships with people that cause me constant frustration as my expectations have me distance myself, withdraw and withhold. I feel victimized and want to get back at the individual who broke promises and ignored agreement. Yet, I want peace.

I have come to realize that the world doesn’t need fixing – no peace required. It is perfect and faultless in providing an environment within which we learn and grow through the trials and tribulations of the circumstances we are presented. That is the whole deal with coming into human form and to Earth University; make all the classes easy and effortless and the learning disappears. Therefore, we need the world the way it is, until we need it another way, and then, it will miraculously become that!

From this Universal Consciousness/Spiritual Intelligence perspective, all corporations and business environments are also perfect for getting the learning we’ve come to get. Perfection is always and everywhere. It’s up to us to get smart enough to recognize such perfection and utilize it for the very purpose for which its presented itself.

My perspective, in this moment, is that we are here, enrolled in Earth School – from nursery school to post-graduate work. We are here to become enlightened to greater and greater degrees. There is no end to which one can become enlightened; learning opportunities just keep on coming. It’s as if the more conscious and enlightened we become the more the Universe creates a greater array of challenges for our species. Eckart Tolle said that never before could a species consciously choose evolution. Evolution: Hmmmmm. Is there ever an end to evolution? I dare say there is none!

How do we evolve? We evolve only when we are at the edge of our comfort zone and are pushed or voluntarily push that edge to include what never before was possible, what could never be imagined and, what now is only a twinkle in our creator’s eye! There is no limit to our evolution as long as we keep ourselves in the game.

Okay, so that sounds as if we can take ourselves out of the game. No, we can’t. And you may think you want to because the game in some ways seems to be getting bigger than you, and scarier than you planned on. It may be; however, what’s important is to focus on what’s yours to do. What course are you currently in and what are the objectives of this particular learning opportunity? No, you can’t take yourself out of the game, because, like Dalai Lama’s hotdog, you are one with everything.

I believe that most of us have some investment in saving the planet – that somewhere in our personal or professional vision statement there’s a word or phrase that reflects this compelling desire to do something to make this a better place for all of us. In the world of business, it’s no different. Yet, we are challenged to do the job we are hired to do, at the same time attempting to cultivate an environment that is healthier to work in. At times we throw up our hands and whine “Is there no peace?”

As I began so I shall complete with “No; probably not.” This doesn’t mean that life will be full of despair, frustration and depression – not anymore than it has been up ‘till now. So, learn to be peaceful within, though the circumstances around you are not to your liking; find what causes a lack of peace. Ask yourself what would be valuable to learn, discover or practice in situations within which you feel out of control – this is how you cultivate peace – at least for moments at a time.

I retired from saving the Earth and all the people and beings that live here too. Sometime I forget that I retired, but when I remember it becomes clearer that what’s mine to do, and what’s only mine to do is to let myself off the hook for being only human, which often includes being less than perfect, not fulfilling other people’s expectations and feeling guilty and shameful about my inadequacies and unworthiness. What’s mine to do is to practice kindness to myself and others and to be mindful of what I do that could be harmful, trying to minimize my impact of the earth.

I love peaceful moments and pray that all of us can share peace – if for only moments at a time. They are exquisite!

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Tagged as: active garage, Dilemmas of being in business, Dr. Rosie Kuhn, earth, echkart tolle, green, Peace, Spirituality in Business

I can’t tell you the number of times over that past few weeks that I’ve heard the term seeing the big picture. I pay attention when something is said two or more times; there’s something to be mined for myself and perhaps for others.

Seeing the Big Picture; what the heck does that mean? What requires one to see the big picture? And, what dilemma becomes apparent when considering the leap? “The Leap?” you might ask. Why would it take a leap?

I’ll give you a number of analogies that might be helpful:

The Fishbowl Analogy:

We are all immersed in a paradigm and reality, much like a fish in the water it swims in. A fish can’t distinguish itself from this water, just as most of us don’t distinguish ourselves from our thoughts, emotions and body sensations; just as most of us don’t distinguish ourselves from the work, roles and details we’ve been attending to, without considering the value of our contribution, the degree of fulfillment, toxicity or dysfunction we may contribute to, and the productivity gained from a business or financial perspective.

The Life Guard Analogy:

If I’m a lifeguard, I’m less likely to see anyone in distress if I’m in the pool swimming around with the rest of the swimmers. I have to be up above the pool in order to get more of a bird’s eye view; this way I can see much more activity and take actions more quickly.

Director of a Play Analogy:

If I’m a director of a play, I’d not be able to see the whole representation or gestalt of a scene if I were on stage directing amid the characters. Seated off stage in the audience or even in the balcony I can see the bigger picture of how the actors engage with each other, the lighting, the set design, the sound quality: I can see things I wouldn’t be able to if I didn’t set myself apart to view get the Big Picture.

In the business environment, getting the Bigger Picture is what Alon is wanting of his new CFO, Chantal; and it’s what she want from the manager, Marko, who she is hiring next week; and, it’s what Alon’s manager is wanting from him, too. Do these individuals have the capacity to see the Bigger Picture and then make leadership decisions that will support what is desired for all?

It’s challenging to pop out of your current fishbowl or context in order to see the Bigger Picture. Again, like a fish, we don’t know that there is a reality outside the fishbowl within which we are immersed. We say “What Fishbowl? What Bigger Picture?” It’s not that we are ignorant, it’s that rarely is there a context that allows us to get that there is a Bigger Picture to see.

Until Chantal was hired as the CFO, it didn’t occur to her that she would need to operate differently from the way she had been working just months ago. Most of us take our Operating Procedure Manual(OPM)  with us to the next level of leadership only to find that we are drained by juggling what we’ve been doing with the requirement of working as if you are holding the Bigger Picture; before you even know what that means. Chantal realized that in order to fulfill her roles as the CFO she’s got to let go of her limiting OPM and take the leap.

Like the woman on the flying trapeze, Chantal will have to let go of a known way of viewing the world. She’ll have to operate from a different and larger perspective, which requires a letting go of the known for the unknown. She’ll be surrendering her invulnerability, and the survival mechanism she developed, that worked well enough to avoid vulnerability. Like all of us, Chantal wants to avoid that moment when she meets the “I don’t know how to make that leap without possibly falling on my face and looking like a complete fool and failure.”

Everyone of us who aspires to something greater than our current fishbowl, our current job, position, role, or level of responsibility has to risk this moment of vulnerability and failure. What makes a good leader and someone who is more likely to get promoted over and over again is the willingness to jump out of the fishbowl, out of the pool, off the stage, in order to see the Bigger Picture from which to lead far more effectively.

The bigger the picture you can hold the more valuable you are to your company and organization

One aspect of being an executive coach that I love is that I’m in a sense a leader’s leader. I hold the bigger picture for my executive clients to live into. I give them a bigger bandwidth within which to experience themselves, their organization and the role they intend to play. I empower them to make the leap and while in the leap experience the transition from who they thought they were to who they are becoming. This noticing of what it’s like to be in the leap – noticing the various muscles that are used to engage, maintain and complete the leap is also an aspect of the Bigger Picture that we don’t think about when we ask our direct reports to shift or change their context in order to also see and act from the Big Picture.

Moments of Transcendence

Quite often we have moments of lucidity, where we get the big AH-HA! However, this moments of transcendence dissolve back into are reality that we call normal. Exercising the muscles of awareness through noticing, which constantly nudges one to stay awake and aware, is required for most of us to truly shift our paradigm to include this next level of the Bigger Picture.

The dilemma, which will surely arise is that we are generally committed to maintaining the level of comfort and invulnerability within which we don’t feel threatened and are in jeopardy of losing respect or losing face. In order to let go of the trapeze bar of one level of functioning in order to swing to and grasp another, you have to be committed enough to let go of what no longer serves. Some of us aren’t willing to do this unless we know that there is a secure and well-placed safety net below that will catch us unscathed if we do fall.

One distinction of a good leader is that they are willing to risk the scathing, the failures, and the vulnerability because they are able to see from a bigger picture that these potential risks serve the Bigger Picture. They are committed to this bigger picture enough. Without the ability to see the bigger picture they would not have the level of fearlessness required to make those hard choices.

Rising to the level of incompetence

Formulated by Dr. Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull, the Peter Principle states that “in a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence,” meaning that employees tend to be promoted until they reach a position at which they cannot work competently.

Peter’s corollary states that “in time, every post tends to be occupied by an employee who is incompetent to carry out their duties” and adds that “work is accomplished by those employees who have not yet reached their level of incompetence.” “Managing upward” is the concept of a subordinate finding ways to subtly “manage” superiors in order to limit the damage that they end up doing.

With the Peter Principle in mind then, one perhaps rises to their ability to see the Bigger Picture and then be able to act with competence, fulfilling their duties. It takes commitment and a capacity to expand one’s reality. What are you willing to practice in service to seeing the Bigger Picture and perhaps meet your incompetence? Every great leader must face this exquisite and essential moment of reckoning. And, if they can learn from the experience they have a great capacity to empower others to do the same.

Enjoy the adventure!

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Tagged as: active garage, big picture, Dilemmas of being in business, Dr. Rosie Kuhn, employers, Peace, seeing the big picture, serenity, Spirituality, Spirituality in Business, valuable employees, workplace

A Lens on Life

The Mandala Chart is a multi-faceted lens through which we can observe ourselves and all phenomena. We explored this theme earlier in Flexible Focus #27: In Search of Solutions, in which we saw that flexible focus is fast moving, physical, and multi-dimensional, like a mental Rubik’s Cube. The Principle of Objectivity, the 7^th of 8 principles for the Mandala Chart, takes this process into a deeper, more reflective mode, in which you gain crystal clarity of perception and insight by examining things from multiple perspectives.

Like the crystal cube shown in the illustration, which could also be called a Mandala cube, when the laser beam passes through, it refracts and reveals new surfaces both inside and outside the box. When the light of insight passes through our mind, the Mandala Chart acts in like a lens to reveal new facets and perspectives. This becomes a driving force for creativity and innovation.

Objective thinking is usually associated with science, observation, and experimentation. The effort to measure and get repeatable results works well under controlled laboratory circumstances, but is far less predictable in real life. Complex systems are impossible to describe in terms of linear cause and effect. Hence the quote attributed to MIT Meteorologist Edward Lorenz, “When a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world, it can cause a hurricane in another part of the world.”

Instead of the phrase, cause a hurricane, it might be easier to understand if we say it is connected to a hurricane in another part of the world.Ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus recognized this in saying that, “A hidden connection is stronger than an obvious one.”

In Search of Wisdom

The Mandala Chart also takes an objective approach, but starts with a different set of assumptions, and leads to a different kind of objectivity (冷静 reisei, calm cool; or 霊静 reisei, calm spirit).

Starting with the recognition that nothing is fixed, we realize that our perceptions and observations depend very much on our perspective. Another perspective is not wrong, just different. Seeing a second point of view is only the first step in flexible focus. Having a third perspective is the beginning of wisdom, because 3-dimensions are more flexible than 2-dimensions. In Japanese this is expressed in the proverb, Three heads give you the wisdom of Monju, the Buddhist Deity of Wisdom (San nin yoreba Monju no Chie).

The Mandala Chart gives us 8 perspectives in the A-Chart (3×3 Matrix), and 64 perspectives in the B-Chart (8×8), beyond which it becomes difficult to consciously comprehend. Only God can comprehend the universe from all perspectives. However for us it is enough to recognize that we need to overcome the single-minded stubbornness of thinking that our point of view is the only point of view. If two heads are better than one, and three heads give you wisdom, then why not practice cultivating a more flexible mind?

In Zen Buddhism and in the Martial Arts, this is known as the Beginner’s Mind (初心 shoshin). Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki’s famous statement, “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.”

What are some of the qualities that can help you develop a Beginner’s Mind?

• Curiosity. A beginner is brimming with questions. Make a practice to write down your questions on a daily basis, and to ask them! You can seek answers from other people, or research for yourself, but the driving force is the quest to know.
• Enthusiasm. A beginner embarks on a path filled with surprise and discovery, which generates a childlike eagerness to know more. A lack of enthusiasm is a sure sign that a person has lost the Beginner’s Mind.
• Calmness. A beginner whose curiosity and enthusiasm does not decline enters a new state of mind, that of tranquil awareness, a state of meditation. A rapidly spinning top is calm and poised, while a top that has lost it’s energy wobbles and comes to a dead rest.

As we learn more about the brain, the science of neurology is beginning to catch up with ancient Asian wisdom. If you can change your brain, you can change your life. A book which explores this is in depth is, Buddha’s Brain: the Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, & Wisdom, by Rick Hanson, PH.D, with Richard Mendius, MD.

As you practice thinking with the Mandala Chart, using it as lens to explore your universe, The Principle of Objectivity will help you realize a state of mind which is calm and cool, a state of awareness like that realized in Zen Meditation.

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Tagged as: active garage, buddha, calmness, cube, curiosity, enthusiasm, Flexible Focus, mandala charts, mandala matrix, manga, namba, Peace, shoshin, success, william reed, Zen meditation

In the last eight articles we have looked deeper into the realm of the mind, looking through the lens of consciousness to see our life from higher, bigger, and deeper perspectives. And yet even from vastly different perspectives, it is all in the context of our daily familiar existence. Revisiting these articles will help you re-explore the territories where we have been, and see also how they fit together. These selections also correspond to the primary eight categories covered in the series, so this review provides an overview of one trip around the wheel, and also reflects the amazing range of topics possible to address with the Mandala Chart.

The images are assembled in the Mandala shown here, referenced from the articles and downloads below. In the conventional Mandala fashion, they are marked A (bottom center), B (left center), C (top center), D (right center), E (bottom left), F (top left), G (top right), F (bottom right).

Here are a few notes to set your thoughts in motion. For easy reference, and to trigger new insights, download the Mandala Charts and review the original articles from each of the links below.

MIND MANDALA BODY (From Flexible Focus #38: Flexibility without Forcing)

Out of your comfort zone…into freedom

Many people like the idea of flexibility more than the practice of it. This is understandable, for if the experience takes you out of your comfort zone, you may prefer the familiar to the flexible. When your body is stiff, then physical stretching can feel more like pain than gain. A similar thing happens mentally when your values or beliefs are forcibly stretched beyond their limits. The key to expanding your comfort zone is to have more degrees of freedom. A brittle stick has no degrees of freedom, so anything which bends it, will break it. The fear of breaking causes many people to retreat into their comfort zone when stretched, but rigidity is ultimately a zone of discomfort. When you have more degrees of freedom in your mind and movements, then you experience flexible focus in action!

A NEW MODEL FOR COACHING (From Flexible Focus #39: The Principle of Gratitude)

You are not the only one in trouble…Make the world a better place

One of the hardest lessons of flexibility is letting go of the ego’s attachments. Pride prevents you from achieving flexibility, because it insists on being right, being first, or being better than others. It’s companions are alike, inflexible, stubborn, righteous, and condescending. These attitudes have ruled and ruined empires as well as personal relationships throughout history, and of course are equally evident today. The ancient Greeks called it hubris (hybris), excessive ambition or pride leading to a fall, or to total ruin. In Asian tradition, pride is like the brittle stick which does not bend, but only breaks. The inflexibility of mind, also known as the hardening of the attitudes, is ultimately the cause of the problem. It is better to be flexible, like bamboo.

A NEW KIND OF NATION (From Flexible Focus #40: The 8 Frames of Life: Society)

Social Media is a classless…and virtually free territory

What is your place in society? At one time, and still in many countries, this was a not a question which you were permitted to answer or control. Rather, it was a matter of birth, circumstance, good or bad fortune, and your place in society was largely determined by people and circumstances beyond your control. Throughout history in various times and places, individuals and groups of people have raised this question, and asserted their right of self-determination, the right to determine their own role and mission in society. Now due to the momentum of such movements in the past, and the amazing impact of technology to connect people and facilitate communication, these questions are being raised widely around the world, not just in the traditional style of political movements, but in a brand new style of personal movements.

YOUR ENTIRE LIFE IN A MANDALA PERSPECTIVE (From Flexible Focus #41: Your 100 Year Lifespan)

The past can be changed…and the future is fixed

You periodically encounter popular sayings that life ends or begins at 30, or at 50, depending on the attitude and experience of the person saying it. It is a poor and arbitrary perspective really, and let’s face it, sour grapes living produces sour grapes sayings. Yet there are many people who lose the plot of their life somewhere along the way. If you look closely there is a plot, and although life’s drama unfolds differently for each person, there are underlying themes that are remarkably consistent in a meaningful life. The originator of the MandalaChart system Matsumura Yasuo created a framework using the 8×8 B-style Mandala Chart, called the 100 Year Life Span. He said that, “The past can be changed, and the future is fixed.” How can this be? Commonsense tells us that you cannot change what has already happened, and that no one can say for sure what is coming. However, using the Mandala Chart you can reframe what has happened, and you can pre-frame what is coming.

PUTTING TIME IN A NEW PERSPECTIVE (From Flexible Focus #42: Time Lapse as a Mandala Movie)

The Mandala Chart takes you out of conventional time…gives you a new perspective

The 3×3 framework of the Mandala Chart lends itself well to showing the relationship of the frames as a visual Gestalt, a whole which is greater than the sum of its parts. The bird’s eye view gives you a 3-dimensional perspective. But what about the 4^th dimension, that of time? Most discussions about the 4^th dimension focus on its abstract geometry, trying to visualize what it would be like to be 90-degrees perpendicular to the 3^rd dimension, in effect looking at the transformation of a 3-dimensional object over time. This is not so difficult to imagine if you look at the effect you get in time-lapse photography, where you can watch a flower grow, or see a full day of cloud transformations in the span of a few minutes. Time-lapse in real time – it is even closer at hand than that, because we all experience transformation moment to moment.

WHAT YOU SEE IS NOT WHAT YOU GET (From Flexible Focus #43: 8 Levels of Consciousness)

The central premise…is that our thoughts create our world

As central as the number 8 is to the Mandala Chart and the original Buddhist framework of Wisdom which it is based on, it is not surprising then to find that in this framework there are 8 levels of consciousness. The first five are quite familiar. We call them the five senses: Visual, Auditory, Olfactory, Taste, and Touch, which are how we perceive the world, through our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and touch. The sixth is Ideation, our conscious thought, referred to in Buddhist thought as the Monkey Mind, because it is typically unsettled and constantly chattering. The first six levels of consciousness then make up the conscious mind, the part that we are mostly aware of. What gets interesting is when you delve into the subconscious mind, which has two layers; the Mana (Obscuration/Shadow) consciousness, which we refer to as the Ego, and the Seed (Storehouse) consciousness at the core.

A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF BALANCE (From Flexible Focus #44: Lessons in Life Balance)

How many things are juggled already in perfect balance…without any effort or interference on our part

The common word for it is Work-Life Balance, the challenge and stress of giving proper attention and time to both work and family. Part of the challenge is that every individual’s situation is unique. No one pattern fits all. Sometimes the stress is generated not so much by the situation, as by the person’s thoughts and attitudes in responding to it. Particularly stressful is the effort to give equal attention or equal time to everything. This cannot be done, though you can work yourself into a frenzy trying. At the end of the day, what really makes for Life Balance is not how you juggle the parts, but whether or not you maintain a calm center.

ABUNDANCE IN 8 AREAS OF LIFE (From Flexible Focus #45: My Cup Runneth Over)

Gratitude grows into giving…and is a principle seen everywhere in nature

In our pursuit of prosperity, we tend to take for granted the blessings that we already have in abundance. A Greek myth which made a big impression on me as a child was the story of King Midas and the Golden Touch. The King was granted a gift to his greed that whatever he touched would turn to gold, but the gift was a curse because he petrified everything and everyone he touched, turning it into a golden object devoid of life. Gold is as perennial in our culture as greed itself. While we talk about a heart of gold, good as gold, and the Golden Age, we often find that gold can bring out the worst in human nature, from gold diggers to Goldfinger. It is often taken as a symbol of wealth, the gold standard. But it is seldom seen as a symbol of abundance. Let your helping hand be one of Kindness, not a golden touch.

NOTE: The articles in the Flexible Focus series are updated with graphics, links, and attachments on the FLEXIBLE FOCUS Webbrain, a dynamic and navigable map of the entire series. It has a searchable visual index, and is updated each week as the series develops.

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Tagged as: abundance, active garage, balance, body, calm, coaching, consciousness, ears, eyes, flexibility, Flexible Focus, goals, gold, greed, life, Life Span, mana, mandala charts, manga, matsumura yasuo, midas, Mind, monkey mind, nose, Peace, perspective, seed, Seeds, senses, skin, smell, Society, subcounscious, time, touch, william reed, work life balance

The common word for it is Work-Life Balance, the challenge and stress of giving proper attention and time to both work and family. Part of the challenge is that every individual’s situation is unique. No one pattern fits all.

Sometimes the stress is generated not so much by the situation, as by the person’s thoughts and attitudes in responding to it. Particularly stressful is the effort to do give equal attention or equal time to everything. This cannot be done, though you can work yourself into a frenzy trying.

The juggling pattern

In a previous article in this series we looked at the question, Are Goals Traps or Opportunities? That article looked at four approaches to goals: distracted pursuit, single-minded focus, stepladder thinking, and flexible focus. When you attempt to juggle the elements with anything other than flexible focus, you tend to drop all of the balls.

Juggling is an excellent metaphor for Life Balance, as taught by Michael J. Gelb in his book, More Balls than Hands: Juggling Your Way to Success by Learning to Love Your Mistakes. A good juggler can easily juggle 3 balls with two hands, and a professional can juggle 4 or even 5 balls. However, in life we must juggle far more factors than this, in eight fields of life: health, business, finances, home, society, personal, study, and leisure. This is our challenge.

And yet think about how many things are juggled already in perfect balance without any effort or interference on our part! Your breathing, blood circulation, digestion, sleeping cycles, a vast number of habits and actions we perform without conscious thought or effort. And in the greater scheme of things, the coming and going of the seasons and cycles of nature, the movement of the sun, the moon, and the stars, all of these things are juggled by forces beyond our imagination or control. There is peace of mind in appreciating the process.

A better understanding of balance

A simplistic view of balance is that of equal weights on a scale, like the scales of Lady Justice, dating from ancient Greek and Roman times. While this may be the goal of common law, it is precisely the effort to make everything equal which confounds us in the process of Life Balance. The process is far too dynamic to be able to measure in this way.

Nor is it a matter of trying to please everybody, or do everything. In Japanese, the word happō bijin (八方美人) refers to a person who smiles equally insincerely to everybody. Politicians sometimes fall into this trap, promising all things to all people, and delivering on none.

What metaphors then can help us gain a better understanding of balance, one which is both beautiful and practical? The core metaphor for the Mandala Chart is the zoom lens of flexible focus, through which you can see the big picture, the small detail, and the connections all at once. Through the articles in this series, hopefully by now you have had plenty of practice in flexible focus.

Another metaphor which illustrates the process in an appealing manner is that in the art of Alexander Calder (1989~1976), inventor of the mobile and a pioneer in the art of moving sculpture. It is best if you can see a Calder mobile up close, but there are plenty of Calder art images online to give you the idea. In addition to being asymmetrical and 3-dimensional, they are in constant motion.

“Each element able to move, to stir, to oscillate, to come and go in its relationships with the other elements in its universe. It must not be just a fleeting moment but a physical bond between the varying events in life.”

~Alexander Calder

It would be hard to find a better poetic description of flexible focus.

Soft focus and a calm center

At the end of the day, what really makes for Life Balance is not how you juggle the parts, but whether or not you maintain a calm center. It is in the central frame of the Mandala Chart, the seat of meditation, where you free yourself from the distraction of forces pulling from the outside, yet maintain your awareness and control. You can see it in the eyes of a Buddha statue, soft focus which is all seeing.

In addition to meditation, you can cultivate flexible focus by calm and deep breathing, such as done in the slow movements of Tai Chi Chuan. A compelling image used in this art is that the number of breaths you draw in your lifetime is fixed. Hence calm and deep breathing leads to long life, while quick and shallow breaths can shorten your life. So what is your hurry?

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Tagged as: active garage, calm, deep breathing, Flexible Focus, goals, juggling, Leadership, mandala charts, manga, meditation, opportunities, Peace, priorities, stress, william reed, work life balance

Every day I hear the same thing “I am so busy, that I should /could /didn’t/ nearly…”. Well maybe it is time to think about what it is to be busy? It sure doesn’t sound like the recipe for success?

Every day we go to work with tasks to complete, over and above that we get emails, have to answer telephone calls and interact with colleagues – and those never have any task requests?? So we end up being incredibly busy throughout the day juggling our tasks to get through as many as we can. Sound familiar?

Busy by definition is to remain occupied? “Remaining occupied”, by itself alone, doesn’t sound like it is going to produce extraordinary results, does it?

So, what is it that produces extraordinary results? It is “Purposeful Action“.

Purposeful Action:

1. Produces Results. Results that are well thought of. Results that directly address real concerns.

2. Produces careers. Not just “Busy Work”, but Careers and Careers last a lifetime.

3. Produces Accomplishments. Accomplishments produce powerful identities. Powerful identities produce trust. Trust works like an invisible force that helps your customers choose your offers over your competitors.

4. Is Strategic. It takes care of concerns over a long-term, not just the short-term.

5. Produces Peace of mind. Busyness produces panic. Clearly, peace of mind is a better place to be than a perpetual state of panic.

Now apply this to the Projects you invent… or the project that is your life. Projects are constituted to enact change to move from one situation to another, which is more favorable. There is no guarantee that being busy every day will produce results. However, what is guaranteed is that it will surely produce fatigue. To produce effective change you need to take purposeful action and that is constituted with tasks that are thoughtfully designed, planned and executed.

To act is to produce effective action. To effect positive outcomes for our lives we need to stop Busying and start Acting. Purposefully. Start with an action plan for your life. Be purposeful when you do that… and you’ll see the results!

Tagged as: Accomplishment, Action, active garage, Assessments, Busy, Busying, Busyness, careers, design, Fatigue, Guy Ralfe, http://activegarage.com, Identity, Panic, Peace, planning, purpose, Purposeful, Purposeful Action, Trust