Enjoying Life Right Now

“It’s being here now that’s important. There’s no past, and there’s no future. Time is a very misleading thing. All there is ever, is the now. We can gain experience from the past, but we can’t relive it, and we can hope for the future, but we don’t know if there is one.” ~ George Harrison

I know, I know. I wrote about Ferris Bueller’s Day Off a few weeks ago: Bueller? Bueller? Well, today happens to be the actual 25th anniversary of when the movie was first released. And so, what better day than today to celebrate the joys of going with the flow, savoring the sweetness of all that life offers? Being aware of this moment, right now. And for me, this moment is telling me it is time to relax and step away from the computer…

With Balance, Everything is Better

“Lesson not just karate only, lesson for whole life. Whole life have a balance, everything be better. Understand?” ~ from the movie The Karate Kid

Whoo Hoo!! Today is Monday. To be more specific, today is the first Monday evening in quite a while that I feel relaxed, balanced, at ease. Am I busy? of course. Am I stressed? Absolutely not. What was significantly different about today was that I set myself up to win. Knowing that Mondays are always extra busy, especially in the early AM, I cleared my calendar to be able to deal with whatever life and my business brought my way. In doing so, I was able to stay balanced, and as a result, became more focused and effective.

It seems like such a simple thing, I know, but after taking a good look at where my life wasn’t working, I narrowed it down to Monday mornings  - which led to all day Monday, and sometimes beyond. So, by not resisting the extra busyness I was able to keep my balance. Not only keep it, but was able to bend and go with the flow. Cancellations, tech challenges I was asked to solve, clients sharing their accountabilities and joys,and even preparing for a meeting that fell apart at the last-minute? No big deal, when you have balance. Because, when you have balance, “everything be better.”

Monday, My Way

“Monday, Monday – So good to me…Monday Mornin, it was all I hoped it would be….” ~ John Phillips (The Mamas and the Papas)

For a while now, I have begun to dread Mondays. Which is odd, because I absolutely love what I do. After much thought, I finally figured out where the disconnect is – many of my clients and people I work with are on the East Coast, and I am on the West. What this means is that by 7 AM or so when I get to my computer, I feel like I am already playing catch-up, since they have all gotten several hours of work done, with most of it seeming to end up in my inbox. And, often my clients have had the weekend to think things over and so they reach out Monday morning. All wonderful stuff, and I want to be excited about all the good work we are doing. But, I just get boggled with all the emails and phone calls coming my way. Week after week, I book myself a busy Monday, so busy that it feels like I spend the rest of the week catching up from my crazy Monday.

What if it could be different? What if I could accept that Mondays were days to be of service to my clients, my co-workers, and to myself? Why not accept Monday for what it was, relax into it, instead of filling it to the brim with clients, errands, creative projects and anything else I could possibly cram in? Why not take the time to get into the email-zone and see how many I can knock through? Kind of like the Email Olympics. Make a game of it, a game where everyone wins.

I can hardly wait until NEXT Monday…bring it on!!

Email Napping

“Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task.” ~William James

Take my email inbox – please! Well, actually, since I have 2 active inboxes, take ‘em both. There are times when I am super productive, honing down the number of entries into the teens. And now I find myself, after a really busy period, making the attempt again, at least in one of them. Trouble is, every one of those last 12 emails is important, complicated and/or difficult to complete. Obviously, I have already picked the low-hanging fruit, and now what remains is the fruit that I have to haul out a ladder to reach, only to find that some of it has been picked over by birds.

My inboxes are exhausting me. Just as soon as I clean them up, in comes a bunch of new emails, flooding the inboxes and into my computer and spilling out onto the desk, all over the floor and running down the hallway. I’m drowning in emails.

Truth be told, I just may procrastinate about answering them. Some, the fun ones. I answer right away. Or the squeaky wheels. The more thoughtful ones, I just kind of push around, waiting for inspiration to strike. I am so exhausted by the effort, I decide to go and take a nap. Yawn!

Well, I guess a quick catnap won’t hurt anyone, right?

To-Do, or Not To-Do Lists?

“To-do or not to-do, that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer the endless lists of outrageous expectations, or to take arms against a sea of Post-It Notes and by opposing end them.” ~ What Hamlet MIGHT have said if he were alive today

Lists, and more lists. To-do lists, Ta-da Lists, even Toodledo will do. It seems that the more lists I make, the more there are to make. I even begin to make lists of my lists. What to do?

Even though I am really lucky to have a great memory, sometimes, it takes too much work to go without a list. As a result, I have been looking for the perfect list making system for a while now. When I make a traditional list, sometimes I just get lost in the details. I do a brain dump on paper, and then start working away. The challenge with this system?  I usually start at the top, and unfortunately usually the first thing on my list is “water plants.” So, when I am in the traditional list making phase, I tend to have water-logged houseplants. Then I rebel, and go without a list. Guess what? My house plants get dehydrated, and look pathetic and scraggly. There has to be a balance, if only for the plant’s sake. I briefly flirted with the idea of colored-coded Post-Its, that I could rearrange at will and take down when each task was complete – but they looked messy and drove me crazy. I have begun to explore online systems, but nothing has really been exactly right.

What would make my perfect to-do list system? Something that would be paperless that I could view on both my trusty Macbook Pro and my iPhone. It would be easy to make multiple lists, and move the items around on those lists. My ideal would be something kind of non-linear – kind of like a mind map. Maybe colorful. Also, it would be great so share some lists with my V.A., Bridget Baker Now.

To-do lists should support our lives and our work, not make them more complicated. And, so the search continues…

Have a great to-do system you’d like to share? I’d love to hear!

Embracing Curiosity

“Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge.” ~ Khalil Gibran

Or, knowing I don’t know it all. Today marks the one year anniversary of my other blog, MyGreenAdventure!! I’m not going to pretend and say it was easy to post every Thursday for one year, never missing one single week. Some weeks’ posts just flowed, and other ones were painstakingly slow. I know that I have learned a lot, and the most important thing I have learned is that being perplexed is a gift. In all things green I am allowing myself to embrace my curiosity, creativity and questions and see where they lead. The new adventure is just beginning…

Writing Commitment

At the simplest level, what it means is showing up to write everyday, no matter what life brings my way, and honoring the commitment I made to myself to post in this blog 365 days this year. How am I doing so far? Pretty good, by my standards. I haven’t missed a single day yet. In addition,  I am also posting every Thursday, no matter what, in mygreenadventure.wordpress.com - and have been since April 22, 2010, and writing a monthly newsletter. That’s a lot of words.

Some days it’s easy. I feel inspired, and the words just seem to flow onto the page. But, OH! those other days! Those are the days I would rather just forget the entire thing. Days when I am at the computer until 1:30 in the morning, like today, trying my best not to fall asleep. Days when not one idea (good OR bad) seems to be able to find me. What to do on those days? Some days it feels like I am giving it my absolute all, and there others that it feels like I have nothing to give.

What makes the difference in the energy I bring to my writing projects on a good day and a bad day? Honoring my commitments by giving my writing the time it deserves and  looking for inspiration everywhere I go. Letting myself have an “off day” once in a while and getting back in the saddle anyway. Having fun in the process…

How do you honor a commitment made to yourself?

Step Away from your Work!

Here we are – Friday –  I haven’t had a day off in two weeks, and if we are really counting, haven’t had a day off from writing in 56 days! Thank You, Post A Day 2011 challenge. And guess what? I needed a break to renew my spirits. So, this evening I happened into one of our fave local restaurants - Sellands Market Cafe – for some wonderful comfort food. But somehow, even when I left the work and writing at my desk, it magically followed me into the restaurant, but in a good way. I became engaged in a wonderful and inspiring conversation about sustainability (for more, see MyGreenAdventure next Thursday) at work in some of our local restaurants.

Sometimes, when I begin to lose faith in being able to make a difference, an angel somehow steps in and gives me the inspiration and motivation to stay the course. Someone who is a few steps ahead of me, helping illuminate the way. That happened to me tonight. Not only did I find nourishment for my dreams, but a deep sense of gratitude as well.

What I know is when I am trying to force an outcome, and begin to take myself too seriously, I can lose sight of my dream. And what else I know is that it is still there, ready for a fresh dose of inspiration – often found in unlikely places.  Tomorrow is soon enough to get back in action. Right now, I want to bask in the possibilities…

What is one small thing you can do to renew and recharge right now?

Finding Time for What Matters

“Time is the coin of your life.  It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent.”  ~ Carl Sandburg

One thing about time is that it is finite. No matter how much we try to have it be different, there are only 24 hours in every day and only 7 days in every week. We can take time, make time, find time, save time, waste time. How much time? Time’s up – and then there’s no more time!

So, how do we find the time for what matters? You know, those dreams that are put on hold, delayed until we can “find the time” to get to them. For me, this is the year I spend time on my writing, and as I write this, I realize I want to amend that to: this is the year I spend QUALITY time on my writing. Just last week, it felt like I had to squeeze in a few stolen moments to even write in this blog, late in the evening. The sad result? I found myself dozing off at the keyboard. And, I’m sure what I wrote wasn’t my finest work. Now of course there are, and will be in the future, times that aren’t ideal for writing.  But when I look for that perfect time for my Writing – I have trouble finding any.

When I step into the flow and not make such a big deal about it, the perfect time finds me. A canceled session can become a wonderful gift of time. Quiet time in the evening at the end of the workday can be perfect for writing. And of course, there is the early morning time, when some writers are said to do their best work. But, how willing am I to wake up an hour earlier just to write, or even a half hour, for that matter? It sounds like a grand idea to me now, at 9 PM in the evening, but too often when my alarm goes off extra early, I just hit the snooze button and curl up under my warm blankets. What would it take for me to use that increment of found time? To just throw off the covers and get up? To find a way to be unstoppable and embrace it and my dreams? Of course one easy answer is to preplan – go to bed a little bit earlier. Or, carve out time in the middle of the day for a lovely catnap.  Perhaps just as easy is declaring it out loud for everyone to hear – “I will get up a half hour earlier, and go straight to the computer to write!”

What dream are you willing to make time for? If it matters enough, you CAN find the time!

Routine or Not?

Lately I have been settling into the routine of writing at the end of my day. This generally allows me to put closure to the “busy” part of my life, and move into the “relaxing” part. Sometimes, that is just when the ideas and creativity flows. I trust my instincts. This  doesn’t always work, however, if I am out later in the evening, especially after a long workday. And once this week, I even found myself falling asleep at the keyboard so I could post a daily blog entry. Of course it took three times as long to complete. So, this morning – yes, morning! – I am here, writing. Shaking up my routine.

One of the reasons I am doing this is because of an inspiring post from fellow blogger Bridget Baker, who wrote about getting out of our routines. Read  her post – you will be inspired too. And you know what? I am enjoying this moment of writing with the sun streaming in the window and at the beginning of my day. Thank you, Bridget!

Where in your life can you shake up your routine?