Hola! Welcome to episode#4 of Living and Extraordinary Life Series. This principle ties in well with the last one, which was Sensory Acuity.
Principle #4 is having behavioral flexibility.
You see, it’s stupid to know your outcome, take action toward it and keep doing it even though you’re not getting any closer to your original goal.
Yes, persistence is a great attribute to have, but stubbornness? Not so much. With your awareness you can gauge if the life you’re living is by design or by default.
Living a life by default means you’ve got something off. It could be the timing, the action, the approach, or even your beliefs about the whole thing.
In this podcast, we decode how you can turn-around any situation by being flexible enough about your behaviors. That means you tweak your behavior (action steps, beliefs around your goal etc) and then measure the results.
We also look at a mantra I personally use a lot in my life, and suggest my clients too.
“Do Something Else”
When things are not going the way you’d like them to be, STOP cribbing and whining because from past experience, you know that’s not going to serve you.
Instead, do something else. Do one thing differently. Change something about your action. Try on a new belief.
Stuck for a long time?
Not getting enough results?
Unsure why things are not working?
Shit hit the fan?!
Just do something else.
As simple as that, but works wonders. Try it.
We also decode why we do what we do using BJ Fogg’s Behavior Model.
All behavior is based on reason. For you to behave a certain way, something must be happening right to cause it.
Fogg’s model explains what makes up a behavior (and how you can change it too for behavioral flexibility). Here are the 3 elements we explore in-depth in the podcast:
1. Core motivators
2. Ability
3. Triggers
All this, and more, in this week’s lesson. Listen below and tell me what you think (~17 mins.):
Episode 4: Listen here
Missed Episode 1? Listen here. [~8 mins.]
Missed Episode 2? Listen here. [~12 mins.]
Missed Episode 3? Listen here. [~10 mins.]
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Welcome to episode 3 of Extraordinary Living series! I’m super-excited to bring this lesson to you because personally, I’ve had a hard time with it myself in the past.
Quick recap: In the last two episodes, we looked at knowing your outcome well before-hand (so you can focus) and taking action toward your set outcome.
Want to increase traffic to your website? Great. How much traffic? Get specific. Get that on paper. Then, begin taking action.
The third principle of living an extraordinary life is having a sensory awareness or sensory acuity (as it’s called in NLP or coaching lingo) around your life.
Take a simple scenario: You’ve set your goal and are doing the do. And . . . that’s it. You keep taking action, over and over again, putting your head down to work unsure of whether or not your efforts are yielding results at all.
This happens to the best of us. We set out on a goal and we do what it takes but only a few of us really stop and evaluate what’s happening. It takes an awareness of how you’re responding to life, opportunities, synchronicities and the subtle (and not so subtle) signals around you.
Let’s take an example — a sales person sets a goal to sell 15 cars a month. He applies everything he knows to the t. He listens to his superior, reads lot of books about the psychology behind buying and people’s behavior, and does what it takes.
But instead of making a sale, he ends up losing customers. Nevertheless, our salesman goes by the books and continues doing what he’s doing, without getting any results.
One day, he finds the missing piece of the puzzle — his body language! He’s been saying one thing, trying to look confident but his customers smell a rat from a mile away because his body language sends across a completely different image.
He’s got a new awareness. Now he can apply this new-found knowledge and change his course.
It’s way much smarter to stop and see, hear, and feel what’s happening around you than just putting your head down and working.
That’s your sensory acuity at play. It’s a great tool to have in your toolkit.
How to Develop Better Sensory Acuity
You can enhance and practise your sensory acuity or awareness with this quick exercise.
The next time you’re at a meeting, a party or a family gathering, observe how people respond in terms of their:
1. Words
2. Eye movements
3. Tonality of their voice
4. Changes in the colour of their skin
5. Posture
6. Facial expressions
7. Energy levels
This will help you build a better rapport with them, which leads to stronger relationships.
In your own life, look at the day-to-day and long-term results you’ve created. Want to be healthy? Define healthy first. What does “healthy” mean to you: is it a particular weight or more body muscle?
Look at how you’re doing in the health department right now and whether it’s in alignment to where you’d like to be. Are you close to your outcome?
If not, there’s no point in continuing the “best diet ever” that your BFF suggested 6 months ago — because it’s not taking you where you want to go.
Open your eyes (and other senses); apply your awareness in areas of your life to evaluate your choices and decisions. At any point, you can scrap them and start over. That’s way more cooler than sticking to something that delivers zilch.
Listen to this week’s podcast below (~10 minutes) and as always, let me know what you think! 
Missed Episode 1? Listen here. [~8 mins.]
Missed Episode 2? Listen here. [~12 mins.]
Hiya. Welcome to Episode #2 of successful and extraordinary living. In today’s podcast, we talk about the second step in the series which is taking (massive) action.
[Missed podcast 1? Listen here ~8 mins]
Once you know your outcome, it’s not enough to acknowledge it and do nothing. Instead, take that knowledge and convert it into something more tangible through action.
Will Rogers said, “Even if you’re on the right track, you will get run over if you just sit there.”
Have a goal? Great. But unless you’ve taken the first, tiniest action-step toward it, you haven’t truly committed yourself.
Think about the last time you set a great goal for yourself. Pick one that you did not achieve. Now, look closely — did you really commit yourself to it? Did you take the first tiny step toward it? After the first step, did you take the second step toward it?
You stopped midway; you silently announced that your goal was not achievable. You took it as failure and tried to forget about it. But you wanted it so bad that you started blaming yourself for being a “failure” in attempts to justify your giving up.
If that rings a bell, good! Awareness is 95% of the journey.
Most people mistakenly think of their goals as un-achievable, whereas all they really need to do is re-adjust the action steps.
Motion –> Emotion.
Once you get moving, you’ll create pretty extraordinary emotions (happiness, sense of achievement, a feeling of awesome. . .)
Action never sleeps. One step sets a segue for the next, and so on. That’s when you’ve got massive action. That’s when all the ducks line up in a row.
So listen, there’s no problem with your goal. The problem is in your action (or the lack of it).
In this podcast, I share a personal story and decode what kept me from taking action and how I finally had to make the move. I trust you’ll put this into good use.
The podcast is about 12 minutes long, so give it a listen and tell me what you think in the comments below!
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“Most folks are about as happy as they want to be.” ~Abraham Lincoln
I’ll be upfront: I stole the title for this post from Gordon Livingston’s book The Thing You Think You Cannot Do. I am yet to read it but the title spoke to me, so I decided to write about it.
That thing you think you cannot do. I have so many of them. A little over a year ago, my partner expressed his desire to sky dive. I looked at him as if his hair was on fire and set the record straight: You’re free to do it, but I won’t accompany you.
Of course, I was afraid. What happens after the dive? How would the whole thing feel? Will I be safe? Will I die?
(Although, I now know that one’s at a higher risk of dying by driving than sky diving. If you drive, your chance to die in a car wreck is 1 in 6,000 versus that of sky diving, which is 1 in 100,000.)
On the surface, it sounds I’m afraid of the activity of diving, but when I look closer, I can see this pattern in many areas of my life and lives of my clients.
It’s called the fear of the unknown. No rocket science there.
That reminds me of a story my grandma used to tell me when I was little.
The Farmer Who Lived Through Fear
Once upon a time there lived a farmer on the foothills of a huge mountain. The farmer was a simple man, religious and conservative in his thoughts. He feared God. He had a little daughter named Saavi. His wife had passed away a long time ago and it was only him and his daughter living in their small but happy home.
Each day, the farmer woke up at 4 am, bathed, prayed, and milked the cow. At 6 am, he woke Saavi up to get her ready for school. They’d have a humble breakfast together and Saavi would tell him stories from her school. She was an intelligent child and was curious about many things around her.
The farmer was always patient with her questions, answered them in the best way possible. He carefully guarded away his biggest fear from her. But the little girl would always end up asking about the mountain near their house.
“Can we go on the mountain to play?”
“No! I’ve told you many times. The mountain is not safe.”
Days passed by and summer came along. One day, the farmer came home from the fields but could not find Saavi anywhere. He checked with the neighbors but she wasn’t there either. Where had she gone?
The neighbor’s daughter was Saavi’s age. She told the farmer Saavi had mentioned the mountain in school.
What would he do now? He knew the mountain wasn’t safe. Legend said that there was a beast living on the other side of the mountain.
The farmer could not leave his little girl alone. Soon it would be dark. He mustered the courage to do what he’d avoided for 30 years. He started climbing the mountain.
As he neared the top, he shuddered at the thought of the beast, but pulled himself together and kept moving. Soon he reached the spot where he could see what’s been sneaking behind the mountain for years. As he stepped forward, he gasped. In front of him was the most beautiful lake with surrounding green pastures with his daughter sitting beside.
Why Do We Fear the Unknown
Fear happens when you’re living your life in your mind. Your mind has two aspects: one is imagination (future) and other is your memory (past). The fear of the unknown is based in the future – you’re always focused on what is going to happen.
You do not live your life based on what is, but what might be.
Another aspect is your thought. Thoughts lead to feelings, experiences and behavior. You may know that an average human being has anywhere from 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Research states that 80% of these thoughts are negative.
In its simplest form, a thought is a discrete event and a collection of visuals, sound, and words. A thought can influence your mood and action.
Turns out, if you cannot think, you cannot fear. If you were stuck in a wild forest, you’d be naturally afraid. But soon you get tired and sit down under a tree and fall asleep. Do you feel the fear while you’re sleeping? Not likely. Because you’re not consciously thinking while you’re asleep.
Some people, on the other hand, may seek thrill and adrenaline-pumping adventure from this. They channel their thoughts about fear in a completely different way.
A third way to look at it is the lack of knowledge. When you are sitting nice and tight in your comfort zone, you don’t know what lies outside the zone – in other words, you don’t know what you don’t know. Just like the farmer in our story.
Knowledge is empowering. It lets you hack fear. Learn something new and you won’t be afraid of doing it.
How to Beat the Fear of the Unknown
1. Focus on the present
When I was little, I used to be terrified of staying home alone. I would draw up all sorts of scary monster stories in my head.
As I grew up, I started to focus on the present moment. Am I OK now? Yes. Great, what do I want to do next? Read. Ok. What should I read? And so on…
Once I rearranged my focus, my thoughts about the unseen future (and monster) gradually faded away.
2. Take the first step
Are you waiting for courage so you can take action? Because that’s never going to happen.
If you wait for courage to turn up in the mail, you’ll be waiting for a very long time. Courage comes, but only when it sees you’re serious about your goal.
You need to break the cycle and take the first step. Just focus on what could be the next immediate best step for you in this case.
Two years ago, I felt the tug of doing something more with my life. I was comfortable, but I was yearning for “more meaning”. As a writer, I spent most of my days at home in isolation creating amazing stuff for clients. I was contributing through my writing in my own little way. Now I was ready to do it more directly.
It was time to go out and touch more lives and help more people. My next best immediate step was to look up courses offered in my city and study human behavior. And I did that. Took up a course. Soon I started seeing clients one-on-one, and contributing in a larger way.
3. Ask Better Questions
Humans are designed to fill gaps. If someone asks you a question, you come up with an answer. You might have one or you may not, but that doesn’t matter. Your brain wants to fill in the gap and get it answered.
If you ask yourself stupid questions, you’ll get stupid answers. If you ask yourself, “I wonder why they’ll be rejecting me”, your brain will oblige and give you some cool answers unless you’ve found the one that satisfies you (and sucks the most).
Job done. You have an answer ready before the rejection has even happened.
Now, let’s flip the sides and ask a different question:
“I wonder how I can do this even better”
Or,
“How can I make more time to exercise?”
Can you spot the difference? The last two questions presuppose you can do this, and they ask how.
Try it: Ask yourself a great question and watch your brain do its best to answer. For example, if you’re afraid to take the plunge and become an entrepreneur, ask:
“What is the next immediate best step I can take right now?”
It could be a tiny step, and that’s OK. Remember, even slow progress is progress after all.
P.S. In my case, the question I’m asking is “How amazing it’d feel once I’ve conquered my fear of a 3000-feet free fall“. I haven’t yet taken down the sky-dive ‘beast’ but I’ll keep you updated on how I go. Stay tuned!
Image by asafantman.
]]>You’ve heard it over and over: people advising you how to “live” your passion. Modern day gurus will tell you how following your passion is the only way to live a fulfilled life.
Although true to an extent, there is more that goes into the mix. If you know what’s your passion, great. The next step is taking action every single day to realise your goals. And if you’re already doing that, good for you!
But most people get stuck at step one. They don’t know what their passion is (yet). They are clueless about it and hate this question shoved into their face on personal development forums and blogs.
The good news is, there are several ways to find what you’re passionate about and it’s not as hard as you may think. Let’s explore, shall we?
First a Warning: Your passion may not be what you think.
It may not be grand or trying to change the world. It may be that you just love icing cakes, or getting things in order or looking after your kids or something others around you don’t value.
Or it may be something so big you don’t even want to think about it. If it is you can get there in small, easy and enjoyable steps.
Why bother to find your passion?
Because when you find your passion you live with a quiet joy (or maybe even an out loud and boisterous joy if you are more extraverted than me).
Because otherwise you feel discontented and dissatisfied. Because then you can live with all of you and this is deeply satisfying.
How to find your passion (Dif’rent Strokes for Dif’rent Folks)
Some of us are wordy others are not. Some of us love to move others of us find joy in stillness. Here is a smorgasbord of options which hopefully will have something for everyone.
For Movers and Shakers
Start from stillness. Then just let your body move as it wants to. Note any moves you want to block and stop when you don’t feel comfortable.
Just allow your body to move how it wants to. At some point you will realise what you are doing. It may be a specific activity (pretending to play an instrument, making with your hands, dancing or singing) or it may be quality (flow, intensity, freedom or rapid change).
What would it mean for you to move through life this way? What changes would you need to make to your relationships and routines? What is one small and easy thing you can do before you go to sleep to live this way?
For Writers and Readers
Open a fresh page in your journal or a new document on screen. Make a list of what you three things you like to do and three things that you loathe doing.
Take the first thing you like write down why you like it. Then write down why you like that. Then write down why you like that. Keep going until you don’t have an answer – or the answer is ‘just because I do’ or ‘that’s just me’.
Do this for the next two likes as well. Do the same process for the things you loathe. Asking why you dislike them. When you have done this you will have good information about what you like just because you do or just because of who you are.
You will find that this information hangs together around one theme (usually only one). What is the heading you could put them all under?
The theme may be how you do something – so if you end up with a list of very different sports it may be physical activities or if you end up with a range of artistic media, your theme could be self-expression or creativity.
And the theme may be variety – you passion could be being able to change and be stimulated by novelty and try new things.
For Dreamers and Visionaries
Imagine what would be your idea of heaven on earth. It may be your perfect day or week or month or year. If you feel that this is too real then imagine your perfect holiday. Or flying away on a magic carpet to the Land of Happiness.
Imagine this as vividly as you can – with all of your senses. What you see, hear, taste, touch and smell. Explore this ideal – see if you discover things (you may be surprised about what you find yourself doing or what others are doing).
You may be alone of there may be others (just one, a few, lots); who may be doing things (if so, what things?) or nothing in particular. Sense as vividly as you can what it is like to be here: what you sense and how you move and what it feels like to be there. You have built a castle in the air.
Next is the work of building the foundations under it. And you have your vision to inspire you and help you navigate as you do this.
Now that you have found your passion
You have a lifetime to live it and it begins with one step. It can be as big as you like (though don’t just be impulsive and create trouble for yourself) or as small as you like.
Go at your pace, it is your passion and your life. Live it your way. All you have to do is take the first step, then the next and the next.
Your turn
Have you found your passion? Or are you struggling with it? Share your thoughts and experiences below.
Image by Lenny Montana.
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