There is more to life than challenges

What could the point possibly be of finding yourself facing unwanted self imposed challenges daily? This has to count amongst the more irrational behaviours many humans occupy themselves with.

Surely it stands to reason that if you are going to be challenged, that you at the very least find yourself confronted by that which will bring you closer to your overall goals or objectives.

I am currently in training for Iron Man 2011. The challenges that the training presents daily requires huge commitment. I remind myself that I am an Iron Man and that I am going through the training motions to collect my medal next year. The habits and actions required to fulfil this objective repeat themselves daily, from nutrition, training to early morning wake up calls in winter. Brrr. But I know that these actions, habits and challenges are there to ensure that I deliver on my objective and subsequently look forward to engaging them.

How are your current challenges bringing you closer to your objectives? When I look at some of my other daily challenges I often wonder, “What the heck” is this all about?” When did I set myself an objective that would keep me in a constant state of flux with my spouse, or when did I set an objective that I would bemoan the state of business and its accompanying concerns? Nonsense.

Let’s all take a moment to consider what we are doing to our mental health with these unnecessary self imposed no purpose dumb irresponsible state of affairs. Check your challenges at the door. Ask yourself,” which of my many objectives does this challenge relate to” If it doesn’t, boot it.

It is our God given right to celebrate life, claiming our desires and fulfilling them with the actions and circumstances that assist us in being significant. www.kubunye.co.za

Vision- is it enough

How many times have you heard that if you dream it, you can receive it, or heard that just setting goals will magically assist you in achieving all you’ve ever wanted?

I have been a firm believer for years in goal setting and have presented numerous speaking engagements on creating what I believed to be a clear vision, however in the last week I have been brought to a new insight. One where vision and goals are not paramount to success, but rather the importance of having clarity of vision and the accompanying goals. Let me explain by way of an incident that occurred while out on a training mountain bike ride.

On entering the Buffelsdrift Reserve we were rode into our first herd for the day. Wildebeests with young calves cantering alongside their mothers. The sun had just risen and the morning light on the surrounding bush was absolutely beautiful. The ride has a fast descent over rather rocky terrain. We were setting ourselves up for the descent when a herd of Zebra appeared a little down the track. From previous experience we knew that they might have foals with them and brought the bikes to a stop, allowing them to cross the track.

As expected there were some foals with one very young one. He could not have been more than one or two days old. On crossing the path quite close to us the foal got himself tangled in the brush. We were unfortunately very close at the time and the foal proceeded to approach us on the mountain bikes. Zebra foals stay very close to their mothers to assist them in imprinting. Newly born zebras undergo a critical period of imprinting during which they must learn who their mother is. Since the young zebra will follow anything that moves, new mothers are very aggressive toward other mares for the first few hours after they give birth. This aggression prevents the foal from accidentally imprinting upon another female.

This young fellow decided that we were going to make fine parents. Even as a wild animal its instinct to stay close to anything that moved can only be described as overwhelming. My riding partner was being nuzzled by a Zebra foal. We tried to lead it back to the other Zebras but it kept on following right up against us. At one point my riding partner, Charl led the foal around a large bush, bolted back and lay down flat in the grass. The foal found him. This was hilarious. This young foal wasn’t going anywhere. It knew it had to stay close and was not going to get separated again.

We managed to lead the foal to a large dirt road where the other Zebras and the mare were barking. I told my partner to accelerate in an attempt to leave the foal behind. Man, you should have seen the look on that foals face. I am sure it suffered psychological damage from being left behind a second time on the same day. Riding past the Zebras with the foal cantering behind did ensure that it joined up with the mare and the herd. A great ending to two very concerned riders and a foal.

Although this experience was amazing, it left me wondering about that warm fuzzy feeling that we get when we think were on the right track. This young foal had drive, commitment, perseverance and a reasonable belief that if the item was moving and bigger than him, that it could only be his mother as she would not allow anyone else near him.

I believe that our visions and goals are often set using similar guidelines. I believe that we need to re-evaluate our personal vision and goals and reduce to writing the characteristics, specifics and attributes that would enable us to not only recognize but also ensure the successful implementation of our desires, passion and intentions.
It may not be enough to only have desires, passion and intentions. Take time to identify the specifics, characteristics and attributes

Where to start when you don't know where to start

Where do you begin when you are at your wits end and your results do not seem to be working with your beliefs and the things that you seem to be certain of?

This is a question that I am sure has been asked many times by many people since the beginning of time.

The answer to the question lies in clarity and focus. Clarity and certainty of the life and vision that you have for yourself combined with a dedicated focus on the actions required to achieve your desires no matter what the intermittent difficulties may be.

We need to realise and accept that our current lives reflect what we desire and where this statement appears not to be true that we take a moment to re-evaluate our thinking and beliefs.
In my experience we only achieve the lives that we have negotiated for through stating for certain what we believe to be true. . For e.g. business is tough and I’m not sure how were going to make it, I feel tired and fat, etc etc.

I believe that its time to be certain and remove the self doubt that stops us from living the lives that we truly desire. In order to live this life that we desire we have to spend time on discovering what we desire, are passionate about and intend doing with our lives.

Our current lives are only a reflection of our past certainties and no reflection of our future certainties at all. We have to carefully consider what we are thinking and believing daily as these thought will be manifested as certainties in our lives.

The action and behavioural part of our lives is very similar to an iceberg. The part that we experience daily is the top of the iceberg that we see with the larger bulk of the iceberg underwater representing the combined certainty of our thinking and beliefs. The underwater bulk of an iceberg represents at least double the volume of the above water portion.

We often think that if we change our behaviour and work harder with more action that we will change our results. This is the easy part. If we understand that actions translated into results are the last part of the equation then we begin to understand the importance of spending much more time on our thinking, beliefs and certainties in creating a vision of the life we truly desire.

I know that when we spend time on our desires, passions and intentions that our lives reflect them.

Have a great day

What do you see around you that is reflecting your desires, passions or intentions?

With most of the country experiencing a beautiful spring day we had a wonderful opportunity to see more smiles and a generally upbeat attitude all around us.

As the weather heats up Monday nights in the gyms are already getting way busier. Supplement sales are up and folks are back in the gyms, tightening those buns for fun in the sun this spring.

Mountain bike and other riders are out there earlier than ever with more and more runners on the roads enjoying new sunshine and warmer weather.

Everywhere one looks there are loads of really white legs in ever shorter skirts, floral dresses and funky dark glasses. Spring is here.

Most gardens are experiencing a proliferation of birds with the first swallows of summer starting to build their nests. Vegetable gardens are showing real promise and most lawnmower repairman have delivered all the machines that stood in their shops all winter.

How about you? Have you felt the first rays of spring warming you? Has your spirit been lifted by those warm rays on your face?

You can use this time of renewal and growth to take a fresh look at your desires, passions and intentions. Look around you and replace the things you don't like with that which you do.

Go for a walk or a run, call that friend you haven't spoken to, send your folks a thank you card, tell you partner that you love them, smile twice, laugh once, learn a joke , tell the joke, hug someone, give anyone an honest compliment and just take the time to celebrate the awesome gift of life that you have been given.

Have a great day

The Wishbone Effect

 

 

Have you ever wondered what your purpose in life is? Or questioned just what it is that you're meant to be doing here? Many people go through life without asking the question, and then fail to understand their frustration, disappointment or short spells of success.

Then there are many who do question but believe that they do not have the resources and abilities to achieve their dreams and fulfil their purpose.

The challenge is often separating your life's purpose, that which you should achieve and that which you desire in life. I am certain that when you have the opportunity to consider your blessings in life that you may find your dreams and desires a lot more attainable. Consider this before allowing yourself to dream:

You can see… God has placed a hundred million receptors in your eyes enabling you to enjoy the magic of a leaf, a snowflake, a pond, an eagle, a child, a cloud, a star, a rose, a rainbow… and the look of love. How do you expect to see what God has in store for you if you do not appreciate the blessings that surround you? See

You can hear…you have over twenty-four thousand fibres built in each of your ears that vibrate to the wind in the trees, the tides on the rocks, the majesty of an opera, a robin's plea, children at play... and the words I love you. Listen....

 

You can speak... God has given you words that can calm the angry, uplift the despondent, goad the quitter, cheer the unhappy, warm the lonely, praise the worthy, encourage the defeated, teach the ignorant… and say I love you. Speak....

You can move. You are not a tree stuck in one spot while the wind abuses you. You can stretch and run and dance and work, for within you God has designed five hundred muscles, two hundred bones, and seven miles of nerve fibre all synchronized to do your bidding

Your heart is strong. Touch your chest and feel its rhythm, pulsating, hour after hour, day and night, thirty-six million beats each year, year after year, asleep or awake, pumping your blood through more than sixty thousand miles of veins, arteries, and tubing… pumping more than six hundred thousand gallons each year. God has never created such an awesome machine. Use it well...

Your skin is clear and a marvel of creation, needing only that you tend it with soap and oil and brush and care. In time all steels will tarnish and rust, but not your skin. Eventually the strongest of metals will wear, with use, but not that layer that I have constructed around you. Constantly it renews itself, old cells replaced by new, just as the old you is now replaced by the new

Your lungs, the portholes to life support you even in the vilest of environments of your own making, and they labour always to filter live-giving oxygen through six hundred million pockets of folded flesh while they rid your body of gaseous wastes

Within your eight litres of blood are twenty-two trillion blood cells and within each cell are millions of molecules and within each molecule is an atom oscillating at more than ten million times each second. Each second, two million of your blood cells die to be replaced by two million more in a resurrection that has continued since your first birth.

Your brain is the most complex structure in the universe. Within its three pounds are thirteen billion nerve cells, more than three times as many cells as there are people on your earth. To help you file away every perception, every sound, every taste, every smell, every action you have experienced since the day of your birth. God has implanted within your cells, more than one thousand billion billion protein molecules. Every incident in your life is there waiting only your recall. To assist your brain in the control of your body God has dispersed, throughout your form, four million pain-sensitive structures, five hundred thousand touch detectors, and more than two hundred thousand temperature detectors. No nation's gold is better protected than you.

You are God's finest creation.

You have two choices in life. Choose your own purpose and vision or realise that God has abundantly blessed you with more resources than you could ever need and has a clear purpose for you. Allow yourself to believe in the visions that you have had for yourself since birth and full fill the passions of your heart. You know them well.

 

 

 

Higher Success peaks

The Wider the base the higher the peak. Our success and failures are largely controlled by our habits. The actions we fulfill the most of (do most often) will result in the habits that we are best at.

The more you run the fitter you get. The more you complain about someone's behavior, the more irritated you become. The more you look for things to be grateful for daily, the more you see opportunities presented to you.

Consistency of good habits is the key to developing great capacity for success. Focus on the actions that you believe will create great habits leading to awesome successes and attempt to fulfill at least one new action daily.

When you’re running in circles, you have to say- I have to go now

There are times when you may feel over whelmed by all the apparent pressure on you. You're being pulled from side to side, trying to please everyone. You may be experiencing feelings of guilt at not being able to fulfil what others are expecting of you as well as an indebtedness to people that have seemingly assisted you and you don't want to let them down. All the supposedly important stuff is for someone else. Priorities set are not yours and you are wondering how you managed yourself into this position.

When you're running in circles and life just feels like it's getting too much, you need to take a look around, be brave and say – I have to go now.

What is it that you want? What is it that you need? What are your passions, desires and intentions? Have you been so busy pleasing others that you have forgotten what your dreams and goals are?

The more focused we are on other peoples goals and priorities the less time we have for our own. Surely your goals should enjoy priority in your life? Take a break and stop for a moment to appreciate the things you can be truly grateful for. There is so much going on in our lives that we forget to appreciate them. The friends, family, health, careers, fun, laughter, smiles, a full stomach and people that really want you to succeed in your goals and dreams.

You are capable of deciding your own destiny. The question is which path will you choose? Will you choose the path where you are constantly frustrated or the path that satisfies your passions and desires?

Stop, look around and say "I have to go now" and move on with your passions, desires and purpose.