Your a feckin Champion, you know that?

Is there a success virus do you think? Watching the Olympics over the last 10 days or so, it seems like, for Team GB anyway, that success has become infectious. Spreading from one member of the team to the next, giving people hope, encouragement and an extra push when it matters. 

Success does that. I remember in a previous 'life' (when I had a 'proper' job!) working for one of the UKs biggest banks and financial institutions when that success was infecting the whole country. We called the infection the dot.com boom. It felt like everyone was financially invincible. Put money here, make a packet quickly, get out while the going is good. It didn't last. 

A company called LastMinute.com came along.  The news showed clips of desperate people running trying to get their applications in just before it closed, it was going to be amazing. They were all going to be rich by the next week. Sadly, LastMinute.com launched at 8am and by 10am had started to fall. It never recovered and, 12 years later, has never reached its opening share price. 

This is when people are tested. Not when success is there, but when success stops. 

It's all natural law, what goes up must come down, nothing is constant, entropy.  But it is when this happens that the truly successful set themselves apart. The strongest system, survives. The strongest genes, survive. The strongest company, survives. The strongest people, survive.

When all the success is gone amd the pushing and encouragement stops there is an important thought. Success is temporary, but so is the lack of it.  It's time for evolution not panic or fear.  

Stock markets go up and down. It's the nature of the machine. But it will survive because some people will never, ever give up. 

The Olympic glow will pass, some people will decide they will never succeed but the strongest and most committed will be back and be champions. Why? Because they will never, ever give up. 

In your life, whatever it is that is happening for you now will pass (ups or downs).  Your success or lack of it is temporary and you can either face it like a champion or this can be your LastMinute. 

Never, ever give up. Be infected and stay infected by success. 

Quick Progress Update

Wee quickie: Progress, how do you know you've made it?

I meet a lot of people who tell me how stuck they are yet, when they tell me the things they have done, you find out they are amazing. One of the problems, in my opinion, is how stuck people gauge their personal progress.

So here's a wee thing; think about yourself a year ago.  Think about who you were, where your life was, what you knew and what you were doing.  Now ask yourself, how has the 'now' you progressed from the 'then' you?

Now, think about yourself three years ago and ask the same questions.

Keep going if you want to really become amazed at yourself. You ten years ago and you now are very different people I bet!

You've never stopped progressing.  Every day you become more special. You should just accept how special you are :)

Ah jaysus, I'm on fire!

When was the last time you felt a spark? You know those moments when, from somewhere, something begins. It can be something sparking inside you or maybe it's a spark that jumps between you and someone else, but you know the feeling I'm talking about. Think, when was the last time you felt it?

I've wondered how cool it would be to bottle 'spark'! What would you do with it if you got it?

The interesting thing is that, scientifically speaking, sparks require polarity, positive and negative.  That's something we all accept.

So why in life do positive and negative not create sparks. In fact, they tend to repel each other and attract themselves. It contravenes every law of physics we know!   In some cases it does work, for example the spark between masculine and feminine, but what is it we have to do to create a spark within ourselves? 

I don't necessarily have the 'right' answer (although I'm intrigued to know if you have thoughts) but here's a thought. When I speak, coach and train I often feel the spark between me and the people I am talking to. It's a tangible energy that builds up between us and often starts a fire that keeps on burning long after we have done what we came to do (and can I pop in here that it burns in us all, including me).  So what if a spark isn't a spark caused by polarity, what if it is a spark of pure energy?

Given enough energy you can ignite anything but to really catch it needs two things persistence and focus. It's the life equivalent of sunshine and a magnifying glass. So here's a wee thought for you tonight, what is it that you want so much that when you think about it you feel that spark do everything it can to ignite. Think about it and feel it. But this time, just for 5 minutes, don't ignore it. Don't run from it. Don't extinguish it. Focus everything you have on it. Dream it, feel it, imagine it, live it.  Feel that spark turn into a small flame and allow it to begin burning. When it is, go to sleep and allow it to really catch overnight so that when you wake tomorrow, you're on fire.

"It only takes one tree to make a thousand matches, only takes one match to burn a thousand trees"

Too right you should be frustrated...

So, there I was tonight sitting in a relatively major traffic jam, listening to the Olympics and relaxing. I had nowhere to be so the easiest thing to do is just to chill out, isn't it? I have 20 minutes where I can be and will be nowhere else, so why stress?

That got me thinking.

I was watching the cars that seem to be really, really eager to get nowhere; pushing up behind the car in front. Filling gaps of a few metres with misplaced haste as if them filling the gap makes the queue move quicker. And I asked myself the question "why is it people get so frustrated when they have a perfect chance to do nothing yet do nothing when they have every chance to do something?".  It sounds complex but I don't think it is. I think it's really simple.

Pictures. It's all a matter of pictures.

When people sit in traffic jams, they have a clear picture of where they want to be playing inside their heads. The gap between sitting in the jam and that picture of where they should/want to be causes the frustration. Take the phrase 'I've got better places to be than sitting in this bloody traffic' as an example.

So why don't we do that in our lives? Why don't you try running a picture of a fitter, healthier, happier you inside your head and run it sooooo vividly that the fact you aren't there already causes you so much frustration you would do anything to be there now? Why is it that we use all our mind's incredible resources on traffic jams and so little on making ourselves who we want to be?

Run the picture now. Be frustrated at the fact you aren't there already. Promise yourself that yo are going to use that frustration as fuel to close the gap, to drive up the arse of the things you don't want until they get out of your bloody way and you can get to where you want to be instead.
Vroom, vroom, people! You've got better places to be than where you are :)

7 Rules of Life - 3. Energy goes where attention goes

7 Rules of Life - 3. Energy goes where attention goes

How are you tonight?  Good?  Or not?

The answer to that question will tell you where your internal focus is pointing.  

If it points towards being back at work tomorrow, your packed inbox and the multitude of phone calls you have to make then, guess what, you'll get to feel stressed and possibly even anxious.

If it points towards these precious moments with family, friends or just you being you then you'll get to feel good, loved perhaps, possible even content and happy.

The only difference is focus.

Too many people spend hours, days, weeks, years, even lifetimes focusing all our attention on what we don't want.  It's ruddy bonkers!! Stop it!!  Why would you waste your energy and thought on what you don't want?  Have you not realised that it isn't free?  It costs you, every time you do it.  It costs you time, energy and saps you.  Do you sleep properly? If not, what is the thought(s) that keep you awake?  Bet you it's lots of thoughts about what you don't want.

I'm into energy investment.

When you focus on what you want, when you focus on the people that love you, the things you have achieved, the things you will achieve, the dreams you have and the joy of a future that you are in control of not only does it not cost you anything but you also get interest on every ounce of energy you invest.  It just keeps on coming.  

You give power to your emotions by directing thought towards them.  Which ones are you empowering?

Aloha

Congratulations, you've been successful...or have you?

What is success? I mean, I know what we're told success is but that isn't actually what success is.

I think sometimes we're all hypnotised to believe that if we don't have the big house, the fancy car, the right label on our clothes, the right body or even the right kids that we're not successful. There are a lot of people out there striving and pushing and stressing to achieve a dream that they will realise, when they get there, was actually someone else's dream, not theirs. 

Success is subjective, it's a personal thing. You might even be successful now if you just paid attention to what you have rather than what you think you want to have!

For me, walking around the shops today laughing with my oldest daughter, taking my family out for dinner last night to celebrate some recent successes from all of us, looking forward to another 2 years of my wife being a student and achieving her dreams and many other things are my gauges of success before anything else comes close.

Money is nice but sharing in love and respect of all those around you is success. After all, driving your nice car into your nice house all alone would be, let's face it, pretty dull.

Love and respect :)

The dusty corners of your head

I was digging through some old files on the computer tonight getting ready to transfer onto my shiny new one and I found some amazing things that I'd forgotten.  Things I'd put some serious work into, filed away and then never looked back on as life and HeadStrong moved on.  If I must say so myself, some of it is really good!  And some of it has reminded me of many of the things that were important to me back then and perhaps should be important to me now (i'm going to post one of those things straight after this post).

This is what happens isn't it?  We work hard to make things like relationships, careers, lives, hobbies, businesses, families, health and then before we know it we forget the hard work we put in and take it for granted.  Just another file in the big disc drive of life.

If you look back tonight, what have you done that you are proud of?  The answer 'nothing' is banned due to the fact it's total bollocks, there will be at least one thing if you are really honest with yourself.

We put work into these things because they matter and because they are important to us. So keep them, cherish them, repurpose them and realise that much of what was important to you then, if your honest, is still important now.

Be proud of your old files.  They made you who you are today and many of them can help you become the person you want to be tomorrow.

Tough Love on a Saturday

Righty oh, it's tough love time. I'm delivering a course this weekend and one of the parts of it involves our amazing delegates telling us stories about things that have happened to them at any point in their lives. But this is raising a problem.

The problem isn't the presentations or the speaking. Nope. The problem is our delegates accepting how amazing they are and the incredible things they know, have done, have seen and have experienced. This happened to me yesterday as well and is frankly happening so much I think this may be something that many people are affected by.

So, I have to ask, do you not have any idea how simply amazing you are? Do you have no idea how special, unique and incredible some of your experiences are? Do you just gloss over your stunning achievements dismissing them as just something you did?

You are f**king incredible. You, and I don't know you personally, will have been a part of some incredible things but do you ever stop long enough to really, truly appreciate them?

Today we found people who have;
- done the biggest bungee jump in the world, "yeah, but noone would find that interesting" - WRONG! IT'S AMAZING!

- changed the face of all the worlds theme parks forever, "but it's not really a story" - WRONG! IT'S AMAZING!

- had coincidental meetings with Glasgow friends on deserted islands 300 miles off the Gold Coast of Australia "it was just one of those things" - WRONG! IT'S AMAZING!

Do you not get it? You are special and the things you have done are special. You should be proud of everything, the ups and the downs.

Spend at least a few minutes of tonight enjoying the amazing things you have done. And then go do some more...