Getting Out of Your Head

Posted on 29 February 2008

Somebody asked a question the other day on a forum I was reading entitled; “How do I get out of my own head.” I didn’t have time to answer at the time because I was too busy either pondering the meaning of life or getting the laundry in, I forget which now. It’s really a great question, especially when asked in the cold light of day in a self development forum rather than at 3.00am in a hot, sweaty nightclub by some guy with a shaky jaw that appears to have misplaced his shirt.


I think without him even realizing it, the person that asked that question is half way there. Most people can’t, or rather don’t, get out of their own head because they never realize that there is an alternative. They think that this is how life is, that how they think is how everybody else thinks, or at least should think. They will usually possess a conviction that they have no power over their own thoughts and will often proudly announce to me during sessions “I really have no control over the conversations I have in my own head” That will usually lead me too glance suspiciously over both my shoulders, lean forward in my chair and ask in a conspiratorial whisper “Then who does?” Let me say at this stage, if they are wearing a tin foil hat and hopping around on one leg muttering lines from Celine Dion songs I tend to not bother with this conversation and refer them on to Dr. Phil.


We all have a chattering voice inside our head pretty much 24/7. Even when you think yours isn’t saying anything, it probably is. It chats to you when you’re at work, it chats to you when you’re at home it even chats to you when you kindly ask it not to. It can talk good supportive stuff, bad aggressive stuff or even really annoying stuff like the occasions when it decides it’s going to hum the ‘Birdy Song’ for the next 8 hours whether you like it or not.


The above is how most of us view the voice, we disassociate from it. We refer to it as THE voice or A voice and distance ourselves from it. That may lesson the impact of some of the really negative stuff (equally it may not), but it also has the effect of making us feel like victims and losing the belief that we can change the situation.  So how about trying this on for size and repeating the paragraph below? If you are in a large office make sure you stand up and speak very loudly so those people at the back can hear clearly. You might want to hold fire with the promotion request for a week or two afterwards though.


“I chat to myself when I’m at work, I chat to myself when I’m at home, and I even chat to myself when I don’t want to. I can talk good supportive stuff, bad aggressive stuff or even really annoying stuff like when I decide to hum the ‘Birdy Song’ for 8 hours.”


Does that feel different? It may actually feel worse, but that’s not important because it will almost certainly feel like you have more control and that’s what really matters.


Now say this:
“I now recognize and accept I have complete dominion inside my own head and from now on I intend to be helpful, caring and supportive of myself. I will always strive to see the positive in every situation and make sure I buy all Tim’s books as well as recommending his Blog and Life Coaching services to every person I meet”


That’s the easy bit, now comes the work. Please repeat that phrase everyday for the rest of your life and also whenever you hear ‘The Voice’ giving you a hard time.
At this point people often tell me they’ve tried this out and it’s not as successful as they imagined. “No kidding, my Blog traffic has gone nowhere” I usually think to myself. What’s usually happened, is that they’ve tried it a few times and then simply forgotten to keep it going or been discouraged by the fact that they aren’t feeling like Pollyanna on Prozac after two days.


I’m going to give you some tips on ways to change your thinking as well as getting out of your own head, but it will have to be next post. I know I’m such a tease, but I have stuff to do and anyway, you should be getting some work done.

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The Insane Life Coach

Posted on 26 February 2008

I’m sure you are familiar with quote “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” I have seen this attributed to Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein and probably Dr. Ruth so who actually said it is anybody’s guess, but it’s an interesting little quote, and one I use with clients from time to time.

I’ve had a fairly stressful few days as you can imagine if you have read the post below. I justified it somewhat by thinking about the Holmes-Rahe Scale. In case you aren’t familiar with it, the Holmes-Rahe Scale grades events in our lives according to the stress impact they are likely to have on us. In and of itself it’s a really great way to increase stress levels. Imagine coping with some adverse event really well, but on checking the scale realizing that you should be feeling much worse than you do! That’s not particularly helpful in my opinion, and neither is the scale.

I’m sure you have used phrases like “My boss stresses me out” or “This weather stresses me out” or even “I’m stressed senseless because Fox TV refuses to show 24 this year because of the writers strike, and my life is a meaningless sham without it” I know I have.

People use such phrases without even stopping to think about them and seldom do the recipients bat an eyelid because it’s become every day language. Let’s face it; modern society is stressful, right? Wrong, wrong and thrice wrong. It is no more stressful living in modern society than it was living in Victorian society or Jacobean society or even Elizabethan society for that matter. I’m just showing of with my knowledge of English history now, sorry.

I often tell life coaching clients that the only stress we feel is the stress we impose on ourselves. That’s also true for smug Life Coach’s that sometimes forget that they are not immune to the laws of nature.

There’s one simple way to demonstrate what I mean. Have you ever felt stressed by circumstances and somebody else was relaxed about the exact same circumstances? In that case, by definition, it can’t be the event that is stressing you, but the interpretation that you are placing on it. There is no tangible entity called stress. You can’t bottle it up, put it in a cupboard or nail it to the floor. It’s more nebulous than a Paula Abdul critique when she realizes a singer is crap on American idol. It doesn’t get much more nebulous than that.

So having established stress is in the eye and even the ear of the beholder, you’d think I’d have it cracked by now. Well to some extent I have, and normally I run at about 15% of the stress levels I did four years ago. Occasionally though relapse and forget the basics. In terms of conquering stress there are some obvious don’ts. Don’t drink alcohol to excess, don’t drink caffeine to excess, don’t smoke and don’t sit around dwelling on negative thoughts. After my mum passed away, I drank too much (alcohol and caffeine) and fretted too much. Fortunately, I don’t smoke although I did think about starting just to get a matching set. I do know better, but my habits of a (hopefully previous) lifetime kicked in. Feel stressed = drink alcohol to sleep, drink coffee to wake and worry about it all into the bargain.

Did it ever work, did it ever make me sleep better, feel more awake and feel sorry for myself less? Of course it didn’t, it made me feel worse. What was that definition of insanity again?


So on Sunday I decided to break the cycle. Firstly, I cut out the alcohol, I reduced the coffee to one cup in the morning, and most importantly, I started to focus on the positive again. I’m not going to give myself a hard time for slipping back because it was a learning experience and that is what life is all about. And anyway, giving myself a hard time would just stress me out.

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Another Blog On Gratitude

Posted on 23 February 2008

I sometimes have clients and people I meet tell me that they inherited certain traits from their parents. Seldom do they impart this information with a smile on their lips and a sense of gratitude in their voice. The reason being the characteristic in question is always one that they see as being a hindrance rather than benefit.

I hear things like “I get my negative outlook from my mum” or “I get my quick temper from my dad”
Then I get people telling me that it’s because of their parents their life isn’t firing on all cylinders because they followed their wishes in choosing a career, a partner or friends that weren’t suitable for them. No doubt they will be delighted when they hear their kids saying the same thing in a few years time.

I don’t think I’ve ever complimented somebody and they have shot back with something along the lines of “Well yeh thanks for the compliment, but you really should tell my mum, she was the one that instilled a sense of honesty in me” or “You’re right I am funny, but I can’t take the credit, that comes from my dad”

I’m not blaming anybody for this, I’m not saying that it’s unusual or that I haven’t done the same on occasions, but I am saying it’s a huge shame for two reasons. Firstly, we are abdicating personal responsibility for our lives and that never augurs well for our future happiness.

Secondly, we are doing a huge disservice to the two people that brought us into this world. I understand that for the tiny minority of people that were abused by parents that is difficult to embrace and I wouldn’t for one-minute try and persuade them otherwise. Although having said that, the act of forgiveness and letting go can be incredibly powerful and liberating, so it may be worth trying out.

My mum has been really sick for over 6 months now. I have been back to the UK to see her 3 times in as many months and each time when I left I thought I’d not see her again. Yesterday she was finally relieved of her suffering and slipped away. It was tough being 4,500 miles away because I wanted to be with my family.

When my day died 6 years ago, we all sat round the following day drinking his wine and telling funny stories that involved him and laughed our asses off. He would have liked that and it was a lot better than feeling miserable. I’ve missed being able to do that although I did get the chance to talk to my sisters and other family members and have a joke.

I’m going to tell you something now that may look cold in print and if you don’t know me, but that’s a risk I’m prepared to take. I phoned my sister this morning to tell her I’d got a flight and chat about funeral arrangements. She has a restaurant and is a great cook so we plan on inviting friends and family back to her house after the service and she is going to arrange the food. The irony is that she lives in a house that my mum and dad lived in 30 years ago. It changed hands in between but it was always my mum’s favorite house, so that is quite fitting.

The house is only about 200 yards from the Church and we were discussing how many cars we needed. I suggested that one was enough for immediate family and everybody else could walk up. “In fact” I said, “Why don’t we save some money, dispense with the cars altogether and just carry her up?” Ju started laughing and said “But what about taking her to the crematorium after?” and I replied, “I dunno, maybe we could mail her in?” We both started laughing and Ju had to explain to other people there what we were laughing at.

I got my sense of humor from my mum and I KNOW she would have appreciated that. I also got my love of socializing and my intelligence, although the latter may have some people raising their eyebrows. My dad passed away 6 years ago and left me with an ability to talk to anybody, tenacity and a belief in my own abilities. I like the attributes both of my parents left me and I’m grateful for them which is why they are the only ones I’m going to think about.

The last time I saw my mum, when I left her she had a rare moment of clarity. I gave her a hug and she said “Take care of yourself, you’re very special, you know?” She was right, I am very special, and so are you, and so was she.

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The Big Five For Life

Posted on 21 February 2008

I first read ‘The Why Café’ by John P Strelecky at the end of 2006 and thoroughly enjoyed it. I was surprised to find out that the author lived just down the road from me and decided to contact him. After a few e-mails we met for breakfast and hit it off. I found John to be honest, amusing, and thoughtful, with a high degree of integrity and an insatiable appetite for helping people.

Following that, I attended one of his ‘Big Five For Life’ workshops and was blown away by a stunning concept he had come up with. Like all great ideas it was simplicity itself. Johns idea was to replicate the notion that most people who participate in African safari vacations, judge their success by how many of the ‘big five’ game animals they see. For your information the ‘big five’ are: Lion, Rhino, Elephant, Leopard & Buffalo.

John carried the concept over to peoples goals in life by asking the question: What are the 5 things that they you like to see, feel or experience before you die to make you believe that your life was a success as you judge success? Simple eh?

Imagine next time you speak to a casual acquaintance you ask them that question, rather than “Wassup?” or “Have you got gravy on your tie?” or even “Did you see that women burst into tears on American Idol last night?” Do you think that might make for a slightly more interesting conversation? If your answer is no, and you’d rather spend an hour discussing what in Gods name Paula Abdul was banging on about, you may as well stop reading now because you’re in the wrong place.

‘The Why Café’ was a very cool and thought-provoking book, as was African Safari, John’s follow up. ‘The Big Five For Life’ is better than both in my opinion. It will be classed as a business book but I don’t think that does it justice, because it seems to me like it’s a book on life.



The book is a novel based on the final days of a highly successful businessman who is dying from a brain tumor. The story is told from the perspective of a younger friend that has flown home from traveling in Spain to be with his mentor.

There are so many concepts that can be used to make people more succesful in business AND life that I need to re-read it to absorb them all. The main notion is that you don’t have to be a dictator to be a great leader. You can still value people, treat them as equals and want the best for them AND make money. In fact, it makes it more likely! 

I don’t think there was one idea in here that I disagreed with and the way John weaves in the ‘Big Five For Life’ and peoples PFE (Purpose For Existence), ideas that came from his two previous books, is fascinating.

A lot of people will read this book and agree with the premise but still do nothing to change their own lives. On the other hand, some people will read it and act on it, and they are the ones that will really benefit.

One final note: There is a story being retold by the dying entrepreneur involving a conversation between himself and his wife when they were on a safari many years earlier. I don’t want to give too much away, but I will say that conversation actually took place. When you think of that as you read it, it will send goose bumps up your arm. No clues as to who actually had that particular conversation.

You can buy The Big Five For Life here.

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Shockingly Shameless Self-Promotion

Posted on 19 February 2008

I used to subscribe to lots of Ezines and newsletters. I’m guessing that I used to get about 12 million per month, maybe a few less perhaps, but it was a lot and definitely more than 6. Rather unsurprisingly most of them were based around life coaching and self-development because I love reading that stuff. Every time I stumbled across a site that had one of those “Subscribe To Our Free Newsletter” buttons I was clicking away with a passion normally reserved for people hitting the ‘Click Here For Free Porn – And This Time We Really Mean It!’ button. Or so I’m told, I really wouldn’t know anything about that. I think I’ll stop digging and move on now and let us never mention the free porn quote again.

Over the last 12 months I have almost weaned myself of newsletters. In fact I think I’d now rather blindfold myself, strap 15 chickens to my naked body and go and play hunt the Gator in the local swamp than spend the necessary time required to find the useful nugget of information buried so deep in the advertising that you need a shovel, a map and a Bloodhound to find it.

These days I’m more of a Blog man. Yeh I know I’m about 5 years late, but what can I say? I’m English and we’re late for everything.  I love reading good Blogs and there are some brilliant ones out there. I try and link to the ones that I think add value even if sometimes the people don’t link back to me the ********! I’m not bitter though, honest.

Recently I sent some books to people that write Blogs I like and to date I have had 3 reviews published. I don’t know any of these people other than through their Blogs but I am grateful to them and I hope you can check them out below.

You may have noticed that adverts have started popping up on my Blog. I wrestled with my conscience on this decision for months and months before I succumbed. Some posts can take me over an hour to write (I know, can you believe it? An hour for this stuff) and I like to think they are useful to people. Therefore, I thought as long as I link to products and services that are relevant and I know are useful, why not give you guys an opportunity to buy great stuff or do fantastic training?

My Blogs look will change dramatically this week and there will be more ads than now. I’m going to hold onto the Google ads but also introduce some for books and training for companies that I personally know and would recommend. The overall look will be much better and there’ll be no annoying pop-ups that dive in front of something you are reading just as you get to a juicy bit, so rest assured.

In the meantime I’m going to link through to the recent reviews of my book and say this: If you like this Blog you’ll love my book so go and buy it here ;-)

Laura’s Review

Joely’s Review

Shann’s Review

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How Do You Feel Today?

Posted on 18 February 2008

If I bumped into you in the street today and said “How are you buddy?” How would you respond? If you’re a women you’d probably respond by saying “Who you calling buddy, you half-wit?” But let’s presume I have adjusted the question accordingly to reflect the accurate gender, what would you say?
Let me take a stab at the answer. Would it be “I’m alright” or maybe “Not bad” or even “Don’t ask!” by any chance? C’mon you little rascal you can tell me I’m a life coach, it would, wouldn’t it.
A few years ago a friend and I decided to conduct an experiment. We vowed that when anybody asked us how we were, we were going to respond positively, very positively. “I’m not bad”, “I’m struggling along” or “Jeez, I thought nobody would ask, I’m having an awful day! The cat’s puked on the carpet, I have developed this nasty little rash and look at the weather, it’s bloody awful” were unacceptable answers, and this is the key to it, even if they were true.
We decided we were going to answer that we were stunning, or fantastic, or brilliant, or on top of the world, or about to explode with joy at getting to spend so much time on this wonderful planet with so many lovely people.
What do you think happened?
The response usually evoked one of two reactions. Some people would laugh and agree that they were fabulous too, whilst others would look suspicious and ask “Why are you in such a good mood, what’s going on around here?”  The former group often looked relieved too, because now it was ok to admit to feeling good and they didn’t have to pretend to feeling crappy because that’s what was expected.
The really brilliant thing that we started to notice was that it actually started to become our new reality, we did indeed feel wonderful. We started to try and out-do each other by going further and further over the top with our answers and the more we did that, the better we felt. Not only that, but it started to effect people round us positively too as they started to do the same thing.
This story came to mind today when I was reading a thread here about ‘Acting as if”. I love the ‘Act As If” model because I know that it works. It has worked for me and worked for a great many clients. Does it work for everybody? Probably not, at least not if your belief system wont allow it to work, but surely it’s worth suspending judgment and giving it a go. After all, what have you got to lose other than maybe a scowl?

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Chunky Monkey Builds A Plane

Posted on 16 February 2008

Let me make something perfectly clear right from the outset here. This blog is not about monkeys. There are no monkeys, apes, marmosets, gorillas, gibbons, chimpanzees or any other type of Simian you care to mention in this post. So if you have been given a project to create the complete works of Shakespeare using an infinite number of moneys on an infinite number of typewriters and you’re looking for tips, you’re in the wrong place.

I just liked the sound of chunky and monkey. I toyed with funky and hunky but they didn’t quite create the internal pictures that are tree-swinging friends do, not for me anyway. On reflection, I suppose I could have gone for A Hunky Funky Chunky Monkey and even thrown in Spunky for added effect, but I needed to actual type this blog rather than spend 2 hours thinking of the title. So now we have that straightened out, let’s get on with it.

Do you feel overwhelmed a lot? I would say that well over 80% of people that come to me for life coaching, regularly feel overwhelmed. Other people that I speak to socially often mention the feeling of overwhelm and it seems to me that along with procrastination and no win no fee attorney’s, it’s the scourge of modern society.

The double whammy with feeling overwhelmed is that it can often lead to paralysis and inaction at exactly the time we need to do be getting stuff done. Which in turn leads to more crushing feelings because work just keeps piling up.

Most people, and I do stress MOST, feel overwhelmed because they see the big picture and simply do not know where to start. There are exceptions to this. A few people get overwhelmed because they can only focus on the small stuff and can’t ever imagine getting to the bigger picture. Ask yourself which group you fall into? If it’s the latter, save yourself some time and rather than reading the rest of this post go and search YouTube for humorous clips of cute puppy dogs driving cars the wrong way down busy streets. Let me know if you find any.

Imagine your boss tells you that to keep your job you have to make a plane and have it on his desk by Thursday week. Not a model you understand, he wants a full size 747. Obviously you can’t call it a Boeing 747 for legal reasons, so we’ll call it a Boing 858. That’s quite some task you have on your plate there, and it would be easy get overwhelmed and buckle under the challenge.

So what do you do?

If such an undertaking overwhelms you, here is why. You’re first response would almost certainly be to make a mental picture of a plane in your head. That would be swiftly followed up by a voice saying something along the lines “ How the **** am I supposed to do THAT! He’s insane; I knew I shouldn’t have poured mercury into his coffee. No way can I do that!” Or something along those lines. Then you will start to get more and more agitated as you start to think you’re out of your depth.

If on the other hand you’re chilled with the task at hand because you like a bit of a challenge, you’ll have constructed a whole different picture and soundtrack inside your head. You’ll probably be thinking “Right, I’m gonna need some rivets” And you’ll see yourself walking into Lowes (or B & Q if you’re in the UK) and buying 8 tones of rivets.

The difference between the two responses to the same situation is the ability of the second person to chunk the task down. Chunking is the art of taking something that needs to be done and breaking it into easy to manage chunks. I accept that there are quite a lot of chunks to building a plane, but they do get built so somebody is dealing with them.

If in the first instance you’re boss had given you a list that said something like this:

Please do the following tasks in this order and do not move from one task to another until the first is completed.

1. Order 6 tons of rivets to be delivered next week
2. Order 175 gallons of bright yellow paint
3. Ask Bob in Finance if he can give you a check for $7.6m
4. Call Frank at Rolls Royce and tell him you need 4 large engines
5. Send an e-mail out to all employees asking if anybody knows how to fly a plane
6. Order 5,000 bags of small peanuts
7. Borrow some step ladders from maintenance
8. See if you can find a cockpit on Ebay
9. Ask the janitor if he can remove the door to my office and widen it slightly
10. Buy a black box, any type of black box will do, as long as its orange

You’d probably raise an eyebrow, but you’d get on your merry way relaxed in the knowledge that your boss is mental and you’ll have his job sometime soon anyway.

That’s all chunking down is. Taking a large task and breaking it down to smaller tasks and making sure your focus remains on the individual task at hand. Nobody get’s overwhelmed at having to order some rivets, but the thought of such a huge undertaking as building a plane, is an altogether different matter.

How do you deal with large projects and could you make them seem easier by adopting the habit of chunking them down?

Note: This approach also helps with dealing with procrastination.

Sorry about the lack of primates but if you are over 18 and don’t get offended easily check this out it’ll hopefully make you smile. No monkeys were harmed in the making by the way, although the penguin did resent having his small arms made fun of.

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Defend Yourself

Posted on 14 February 2008

If I walked up to you in a bar and called you a Jackass, what would you do? What if a family member said you’re a loser and a jerk?
The truth is you don’t really need to answer either of those questions because although I’m a Life Coach and not a Professor in human behavior, I already know the answer. You’d defend yourself, right? You might be one of the few that buckle under and not bother, but even if you agree with what I say, you’re still way more likely to fight back.
Although I spoke yesterday about how to deal effectively with criticism, dealing with abuse is another matter. It would be cool if we could all smile and thank the person for the feedback, but I’m old enough and wise enough to know that’s not going to happen for the majority of people.
When we come under what we perceive to be attack from outside forces it triggers a natural response to defend ourselves. That may materialize in any number of ways. Some people may burst into tears and hope to garner sympathy, others may hurl insults back and still others may reach for a semi-automatic to bring matters to a rapid conclusion. Hopefully, you don’t fall into any of those categories and you will either be one of those that smile and walk away or resort to logical debate.
Our defense mechanism is what keeps us alive. We don’t play hopscotch on the Interstate, we don’t get on a plane after seeing the pilot stagger out of the airport bar and we never argue with the mother-in-law. Sometimes however, our defense mechanism gets by-passed or simply subjugated by our conscious mind.
Have you ever ripped into a relative only to jump to their defense when an outsider criticized them for doing exactly the same thing? It seems like we sometimes believe that we can criticize loved ones, but others aren’t allowed to. If you multiply that belief tenfold, then you probably get somewhere close to the kind of abuse that people think that they have to put up with from themselves that they wouldn’t accept from others.
You can defend yourself from internal condemnation just as well as you can defend yourself from external attacks. Check out my blog from yesterday on how to deal with criticism, because if the tongue-lashing carries some useful information, then you may want to hold on to that. Your internal chatter has got your best interests at heart even when it doesn’t seem that way, so the option of saying “Thank you” and then smiling and moving on is just as relevant when talking to yourself as to others.
As I have said many times before, you are the most important person in the world to you, so give yourself the respect that you deserve and go easy on yourself, because the alternative will serves nobody, least of all yourself.

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Dealing With Criticism

Posted on 13 February 2008

I often tell people (including myself) to treat criticism as feedback and never to take it personally.

What I talk less about other than to Life Coaching clients who get the good stuff because they pay me, is the strategies to deal with criticism and how use it to your advantage. So guess what? That’s what we’re going to do today. Whether it’s feedback from a failed job interview, a rebuke from your boss or a volley or abuse hurled at you by a drunk in the bar who claims you have a face that reminds him of his mother-in-law. After you read this, you’ll be able to deal with it all in your stride and with a smile on your face.

Probably the most important part of this is that you have to accept that criticism is NEVER personal. I don’t care what anybody says to you, they are only telling you about themselves and their worldview. They could say you that you look like a warthog chewing a pickled egg or that you possess the charm of a pair of monkeys in a poop throwing competition or even that you have the brains of a halibut that has just undergone a lobotomy. It doesn’t matter, it really doesn’t. The moment we take criticism as a personal attack is the moment we lose control of the situation and lose the ability to learn from it.
There’s a well-known story that you may well know, about an incident in which somebody aimed an insult at the Buddha. The Buddha responded to the insult by saying “If somebody gives you a gift and you don’t accept it, who does the gift belong to?” The other person said, “It belongs to the person who gave it.” The Buddha said, “I don’t accept your insult, so it returns to you.”

Accepting that insults or heavy-handed criticism aren’t personal doesn’t mean that you can’t learn from them though. It may be that you only learn more about the other person, but even that can be useful sometimes.

So let’s get down to it and look at the strategy in more detail.

Ask for feedback. If you don’t get a promotion, ask why. If you don’t get that publishing deal, ask why. If you don’t get that date, ask why. Often people wont offer feedback and without it, you are completely in the dark. The cardinal sin here, is to not ask for feedback and then concoct your own reasons why you didn’t get the outcome you wanted. You’ll probably get it wrong and make yourself miserable into the bargain.

Disassociate. When somebody starts to criticize you take a metaphoric step back. View the situation from the position of a 3rd person and observe as though you were watching a conversation between 2 people you don’t know.

Listen. Actively listen to what they say to you. Don’t start sifting for reasons why they are wrong at this point, just listen objectively and keep quiet.

Thank them. It doesn’t matter what they said, thank them anyway. Even if it’s an insult, thank them sincerely. It will make you feel better and probably confuse the hell out of anybody trying to hurt you.

Evaluate. Is this criticism or feedback relevant to you? Is it true? Does it give you valuable insights to do a better job next time? Remain detached from the situation and if in doubt ask other people whether they think it’s true.

Learn. Has it told you some great stuff about yourself that you can now work on? Or has it told you the person you thought was a friend, really isn’t? If you can learn it’s probably been worthwhile.

Move On. Put it behind you and do that the moment you have finished analyzing it. Don’t keep replaying it in your head ad infinitum and making yourself feel bad, there is zero value in that. Take the good stuff and use it and disregard the groundless insults.

That is all there is to it. Easy right? Of course it is, because life’s easy, only people complicate it. I’m sure that’s a quote from somebody but I just Googled it and can’t find it, so I apologize for not attributing it. If it’s not a famous quote, I’m claiming it because it should be!

Addendum: When my book was published last November, it hit the streets with a few typos and editing errors. They were MY fault and nobody else’s. I was down for a short time after I got the advanced copies. Then my wife reminded me that it was the message that was important and I now had the opportunity to make the second run even better. She was right and I learned an important lesson. You can’t buy experience but you can turn it away.

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Stealing Time

Posted on 12 February 2008

I don’t know why, but I wake up at some point during most nights and have done for 20 years or so. In his book Power of Intention, Wayne Dyer suggests that it’s the night calling you to get up and do stuff and you should heed that call. Much as I love Wayne, I also love kipping and I don’t intend getting up at 2.30am or even 3.30am whether it’s the night or the Prince Of Darkness himself calling me.
I’m usually very good at guessing what time it is when I wake up and often get within 2 or 3 minutes. Last night was an exception. I woke up at 12.30am and thought it was 3.00am. As I staggered bleary eyed to the bathroom, (look I was awake ok, so I thought I may as well go and I don’t need any e-mails suggesting I get my prostate checked, it’s fine thanks very much) I was struck by a strange thought. Not as strange as the dream I’d been having about a Dolphin named Eric that was running for President on an Anti-Illegal Mackerel ticket, but strange nevertheless.

What if somebody had turned all the clocks forward an hour in my house so that when I finally got up at 6.00am it was really 5.00am? Would I have been thinking at 1.00pm “Hmm, I’m an hour more tired today, I think somebody snuck into my house and changed all the clocks while I was sleeping”?
Have you ever had to get up an hour earlier and realized part way through the day that you’re no more tired than normal? What about staying in bed for an extra hour or two at the weekend and not really feeling any better or more invigorated? Our bodies are incredibly adaptable and because it’s deep sleep that really dictates how refreshed we feel anyway, those extra few minutes when you hit snooze have little effect on your productivity and the way you feel. Unless that is, you chunter away to yourself all day saying how tired you feel and talk yourself into it. That will always do the trick.
If I had a top 10 list of Blogs stating the blindingly obvious this would probably go straight in at number 1 but hang with me because I’m going to run with it anyway.
Unless you are already getting up at 5.00am or sooner, why not try getting up an hour earlier each day? I know it’s tough and that bed is really warm and snuggly, but you have to get out at some point and just think what you can do with an extra hour every day. If you are staring blankly at this, here are some ideas:
Be fluent in a foreign language within a year
Be an expert in a field of your choosing by reading and studying within a year
Get really fit and kick sand in peoples face on the beach
Become a world class meditator leading to needing even less sleep
Make more money – lots more money
Write a book
Learn to play a musical instrument and annoy other family members in the process
Take up image streaming and visualize your way into the ranks of the super-succesful
I’m sure that you can come up with even more inspiring ideas that will have you bouncing out of bed every morning. It will take a certain amount of discipline to start with, but once it becomes a habit there’ll be no stopping you and world domination is just around the corner.

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