Back To The Future

I love this classic series of movies - and I have introduced my kids to it - because the magic of time travel still fascinates all. There was a key lesson in this movie - about how much energy it took to transport yourself to the past - and then the constant battle of trying to "fix" your past and the impact it has on your future.

Have you ever thought about how much energy you invest in your past? In moaning and groaning about it - in making up elaborate new reasons why it happened that way - re-imagining what it could have been if you had done it differently?

It is a common thing for people to visualise their past and call it a memory - and often our minds play with that memory in different ways - playing and replaying it with various scenarios.

Why is it then such a stretch for people to engage in the act of visualising their future? Of using the same mechanism - but focussing the energy on the future.

If energy can be focussed in strength in only one direction at a time - then if the bulk of your energy is being spent looking back - very little is focussed on looking forward. The scene in the rear-view mirror is simply diagnostic - but it cannot be changed - no matter how you re-imagine you could have done it differently. By turning your focus on your past - you place your Back to the Future.

I suffer from the same affliction and it is a daily struggle to let go of the finished yesterday and rather imagine a yet unpublished tomorrow.

Face forward.

Wheels turning toward a destination along a journey
2, 4 more than I can count
Rubber and steel, carrying 1 or 100 all on a journey to a destination
Go there everyday for the same reason for different motivation
Some know why and where is only a stop on the way to why
Others don't care about the why only that there is a where to get to
And on time please - delays and traffic stay away cause I have to get there - even if I don't know where there is or why I am on my way there....gotta get there on time and preferably before anyone else cause then I win, right? Even if didn't intend to be here, here I am - a winner! The irony of the lack of a prize escapes me...I get used to competing to win nothing....of worthy competition.
And the wheel turns again on the way to a destination along a journey.

Talking to yourself

I run for fun. I haven't in a while so when the universe and I got together we found a nice 16km run brought to me by a friend. It was out in the vineyards in Noordhoek and up onto Chapmans Peak and on Noordhoek beach. Lovely scenic run...wait it wasn't so much a run as it was hiking at pace.

I explained to my wife that there are tough parts that you have to talk yourself through, be your own coach. She asked me what I said and it was the first time I had shared with anyone what I say to myself when I have to push myself through a tough part of a run.I realised that some of these pep talks can be used when I have to push myself through anything.

Here are a few:

- Is that all you've got to throw at me? Come on, I know you are tougher than that (usually used when running against wind) -I also tend to open up my arms and visualise myself gliding.

- Let's open this baby up and see what he's really capable of (yes, I really say that)

- I am an eagle flying above all of this

- I am a flow of energy; I am a point of light

- I also try to smile through the toughest part - what I think of as my "Mona Lisa's Smile", a secret only I know.

We all need reminding and pushing because often the loudest voice is what Srikumar Rao calls the VOJ or the Voice Of Judgment. We need words of encouragement and not words of damnation. Which do you use more often with yourself, your kids, your partner or your staff?

Talk yourself and others up and we will push through. Take the age old saying...if you don't have anything good to say....say nothing.

Try it - open your baby up and see what you really can do!

Inner Light

I was told today that I got my walk back.

I've been going through a growing experience where I had started doubting who I was and my ability - and I took some steps to get me back.

The game of aligning your spirit and your daily actions is not about either a physical change or a mental one - but rather about both.

I read somewhere that it is easier to act yourself into a new way of thinking than to think yourself into a new way of acting. But that is about force of will - I am not refering to a force of will.I am not talking about mind over matter.

I am talking about being spirit-led. I am talking about you feeling your inner light and letting that shine through in your smile, your walk, your talk and your eyes.

All light ahead comes from the light within.

Once I let my inner light shine - I got my walk back.

Da Vinci Code

I am reading a book about Leonardo Da Vinci and how simple his genius was.

All that he did was dedicate his time to the search.

He was always searching and curious. But his curiosity was never just for information - but for discovery and experience - to apply the knowledge of what he learnt. This learning gave him a clear skill - observation. But not like we observe - he observed beyond what can be seen with the eyes.

We often struggle to use our other senses to see. We don't really see people, or nature and how it works together. We often don't even see ourselves - or who we do see is a distorted view of us. When we get a touch of our other senses we dismiss it.

In the book it teaches that Da Vinci was both an artist and a scientist - both hard and soft - the balance of masculine and feminine. His ability to see both sides - and how they are 2 sides of the same thing allowed him to see things more wholly.

We often feel the need to see one side over the other. Why?

We have been trained that there is a right way and a wrong way - and the right way is the perfect way and the wrong way is the way where mistakes are made. Da Vinci taught that you have to give up the idea of perfection and value the experience rather than whether the outcome was perfect or not.

Considered one of the greatest minds of our time - a genius in many disciplines - a visionary who before flight was invented thought about a parachute.....he saw beyond impossible. He suffered hardships because of his free thinking approach - but he never sought consensus because what he saw was not everyone agreeing with him - he saw that because everyone was agreeing with each other no-one was seeing what was really going on. Too busy protecting their point of view.

Alice in Wonderland - think of 6 impossible things everyday. If they were possible how different would your life be?

What do you see?

High on Life

Have you ever thought about addictions? Have you thought about having an addictive personality?

I think we all have an addiction to something. Not the overt substance abuse - but there is something of substance that we abuse.

Are you addicted to being liked?

Are you addicted to pleasing others?

Are you addicted to doing the right thing?

When you are addicted to something you get a benefit from using - the hit brings a result. The result brings a feeling that you get accustomed to - so you build a dependancy.

Once you have a dependancy all your being strives for the next hit - you orchestrate events that will bring about that next hit.

Sometimes your hit or result can be destructive - but still gives you something you build a dependancy on.

Are you addicted to drama?

Are you addicted to being a victim?

Are you addicted to never being right?

Your addiction is there under the surface - sometimes so far beneath that you don't recognise it as an addiction. But it is.

And because some are not socially frowned upon (like success at any cost) - they become acceptable personality traits. So they become part of who you are. And it becomes you. There - you are addicted!

So become addicted to something that brings about good. Choose a good addiction. It's just an extreme habit - and you don't just get rid of a habit - you replace it. Same with an addiction - you don't just stop drinking - you replace drinking with the lifelong addiction of stopping yourself from drinking. It is still an addiction.

What are you addicted to? Is it good or bad? Does it hurt or help? Does it bring out the best or the worst in you.

The fact that you have an addiction isn't bad - it's what you are addicted to that could be.

Become addcited to living a good life. Become obsessed with it.

Get your fix everyday!

When do we learn?

When precisely do we learn? Is it an after the fact process? Can we learn before the mistake by learning from someone elses?

If the answer is no - then it means we have to make our own mistakes to learn.

If the answer is yes - we then don't need to make any mistakes to learn - we just have to observe the mistakes of others.

The truth is they are both not that simple. You can learn from both. The question really is why don't we learn from our mistakes or from others.

I suppose if we're the ones making the mistake we are so busy trying to forget the mistake ever happened or we are trying to hide the mistake that we don't look for the lesson. And if we are hiding the mistake then how is anyone going to observe and learn?

So to avoid any confusion - make your own mistakes and make them publically and make sure the lesson is public too.

That way - you'll learn and teach at the same time.