development only
Congratulations on your decision to join the next Yes to Success Program!
You are successfully registered and will receive further information via email.
Please check your email and consider adding hq@ramakalia.com to your safe senders list.
Thank-you!
Rama
Does the idea of that pull you forward or make you laugh as it seems so far out of reach? 🙂
No wrong answers here – just taking a pulse. Sometimes, when things are going well, we can feel more joyful and marvel at how things just fall into place and other days, we get irritated at one thing and don’t let that irritation go and shake our heads as one thing after another goes ‘wonky’! Technical term I know!
So what is the difference? What are you doing when it all falls into place and what are you doing differently on days where it all goes south? Do you know? I invite you to take more notice of these things… When it goes well – what are you doing? How are you feeling?
Again, when it’s heading south – what are you doing and how are you feeling?
I’m trying to catch myself sooner in the process – so, for example, when I start feeling irritable…
Step 1: Notice.
Step 2: Ask – what is this?
Step 3: Breathe! Take a few deep breaths – disconnect
Step 4: Ask – what do I want instead of this?
Step 5: Choose it!
It’s not rocket science – it’s choice.
And of course remembering we have a choice, especially when we feel like we don’t!
Summers here, school’s out, camp starts in 3-weeks and the baby-sitter quit as she needs a job with more hours… <1st reaction... eye-rolling-grrrrroan>.
Just a head’s up – this months article is a little different from usual, I decided to let you in on a few things that are up with me – as members of my community – I figured you might want to know a little more about who you are connected to? So if that’s ok with you – read on!
I knew I would have to re-evaluate my hours and availability when my LO started camp in July and August and now it seems, I have to do that a little sooner than expected! Don’t you just love it when the Universe pushes you to do something you were considering, by removing other choices? Sometimes? Just a little bit? lol!
I am very grateful I have a business where I have the flexibility to adjust and make new choices, but it does keep you on your toes too… This month is my 12th month of being in this business… almost a full year and frankly, I thought I’d be further along than this… I have always been more than a little demanding of myself. I hold myself to much higher standards than I do others and I am quick to criticize myself when things aren’t quite where I expect them to be. If this sounds a little tough and not very fun, you’re right!
So, I’m going back to basics… Whenever I want to really create something new, the beginning of the creation process for me, is always me getting super-clear on what’s not working, what I really want and what I’m going to do about it… and then taking inspired action. Then it usually unfolds quite quickly… ;0) I also remind myself of Einstein’s definition of insanity… Doing the same thing and expecting a different result… I know I want different results and so, right now, I’m doing some different things… always starting from the inside-out.
So, what am I doing that’s different? It’s often said that it takes a minimum of 21 days to create a new habit, so with that in mind, I’m going to be very focused and make very conscious choices about what food I put into my body for 21 days, I’m going to take myself to bed earlier and rise earlier so I can create time to get back to a (pre-baby!) meditation practice – before my family even wake up, I’m setting intentions again, I’m remembering and applying processes from over fourteen years of study with various teachers, I’m exploring a bunch of new internal processes learned in a recent course with Jean Houston, (btw…wow!), I’m learning new energy management tips and tricks by joining a 21-day course run by my friend, Iris Van Ooyen, I’m journaling again, expressing gratitude again and I have reduced business hours and have more family fun planned for the next 3 weeks… So, I’m changing it up, in just about every way I can…
My way is not for everyone I know that and from past experience, I know new inspiration will show up, ideas I wouldn’t normally have had will occur and lead me to do things I wouldn’t normally have done, if I’d stuck with ‘business as usual’. I have shown myself, time and time again how the Universe has my back and that things I couldn’t possibly have foreseen, just magically fall into place in much better ways than I could ever have made them, or usually have even imagined… (Like my husband and daughter within a few months of each other… ;o) But that’s another story…!)
I know one of the things I want is to get back to the gratitude I had, for creating a flexible service business in the first place; for the simple joy of helping people out of their technology struggles… I love knowing I can make a difference in someone else’s business, by relieving their technology headaches and I can bring a smile to their faces when they see I go above and beyond, to get things done. And I am going to be grateful every day, for the extra time I get to spend with my fun LO at the moment… so, life is good and every day, in every way is getting better and better.
So, I would just LOVE to know – when you come to those places in your life, when you stamp your little foot or shake your fists and shout – ENOUGH! You know what I mean… what kind of things do you do? Email me privately, (or those brave enough, leave a comment on my blog or facebook page!) I would love to know what works for you or even what you think of today’s departure from the norm. And yes – I’m even trying out a new day to send this out – let’s see if Wednesday is any different? ;o)
Stay tuned next month for whatever changes around here… ;o) If you’re still reading, (thank-you!) maybe you’ve just learned that I’m a bit of an all or nothing kind of gal! Maybe you didn’t know that about me?
It was a beautiful day on Sunday and I was finally out working in the yard, I was trying my best to tame a row of 9-10 foot high laurels… they were too big and top-heavy and that caused the bushes to dangerously lean with winter snow and wind. I was trimming them back, shaping, making it neater and then getting a ladder and doing what I could to tame the top… as I was doing this, I was relating this to my business – as I usually do with everything eventually… ;o) I began wondering where or what in my business I could cut back, so that it could have space to breathe and fill-out without the heavy dead weight on top…
One of the places I first thought about was the need to focus my time more on tasks and revenue generating tasks in particular, especially as I will soon be beginning a summer schedule. I’m so lucky that I get to set my own hours for the summer and this is really the first time I am doing this with a business! My daughter will be going to a local summer camp some weeks and I will be freeing up some time so that we can have some family day trips and drum-roll please… an actual vacation – for a whole week! With that in mind, I am revisiting my calendar and commitments and seeing what I can cut out and what I want to remain focused on.
As I followed this train of thought – the thing that came up was – Woohoo! I actually get to trim some of the ‘heaviness’ from my life in general! How? As I have fun activities with family and really enjoy that time away – I’m sure I will be revitalized by that and will bring some of that fresh energy into my business – I mean I am my business, so how can I not? I think the challenge will be in really having clear boundaries between work and play and experimenting with how that feels and how productive I am when I am in the business. Looking forward to finding out!
Stay tuned – I certainly don’t have it all figured out yet… teehee. 🙂
Do you regularly take the time to set intention, to visualize your desired outcome or destination before you take action?
How do think your day would go if you set intention? Do you think – it’s just one more thing to do and I have enough to do already… or maybe, it’s OK for other people, but not for me? Do you think setting intention is weird? Have you thought about setting intentions at all?!
If you want to complete something, get somewhere, reach a goal, do you find it’s easier to get there if you know where you’re going? If you were going on a car journey to an unfamiliar place – you’d probably set the GPS to the destination, correct? In a similar way, weight-loss can be more successful when you visualize yourself at a certain size, in a certain outfit enjoying your new appearance and the reactions of those you meet, really picturing yourself basking in that feeling of success.
I’ve done it both ways, visualizing an outcome and just starting anywhere and I can certainly say, taking an extra moment to see myself completing the action is a better place to start than just jumping in with the action part of ‘doing busy-ness’. There’s a reason athletes take the time to visualize a win, crossing a finish line, a perfect golf stroke or tumbling run, as part of their training… it works.
I’m reminding myself these days, to get back into the habit of visualizing my outcomes, as I plan each week, each day and even each task, asking for the right people, the right information, the right opportunities to show up… and I find I can better recognize them when I already know what I’m looking for. ;o)
I do believe that thoughts create things and I’m choosing to be more conscious, more mindful in where I put my attention these days. Consciously choosing as much as I can, how I want to feel from moment to moment, from task to task and from person to person; choosing to have pleasing interactions, smoothly changing gears from one thing to next, with a quick pause to reset, take a breath and visualize what I want to happen next and to see myself taking satisfaction in doing that next thing. It takes practice to be this way, I for one, was not taught Mindfulness 101 in school – I wish I was! How interesting a world it would be, if everyone was practicing mindfulness and conscious creation of their life; choosing to be happy, choosing service instead of servitude, kindness instead of comparison, co-operation and collaboration instead of competition, response instead of reaction. I’d like to live in a world more like that. I can only affect change in myself. By choosing more mindfulness, more conscious choices, I can begin to BE the change I want to see in the world. How about you?