Take a moment to appreciate what you’ve got.
Think less about what you think you need, but in fact only want.
One day you’ll wish you could get all of this back.
Tag: motivation
Whilst You Can…Do (10)
Forget about how you feel others will perceive you.
Know that you only become free when you do as you wish.
Wear that shirt, do that dance and enjoy those things that make you you.
Whilst You Can…Do (8)
Try to take a positive perspective on things that come your way.
Life is tough and there will always be challenges to face.
But your outlook on those challenges, is just as important as those challenges themselves.
Don’t go through them negatively, instead go over them with positivity.
Whilst You Can…Do (1)
Take the stairs, rather than the lift; one day you won’t be able to.
Convenience is efficiency, but that choice won’t always be there.
One day you’ll long to be able to take the stairs, but your knees won’t let you.
Building Up, Not Down
It’s come to my alarming attention, that a lot of the time when seeing other people’s successes, I’m often wanting to see them fail rather than celebrate their success. I blame this largely down to being involved in sports from a very early age. Sport fosters and builds a competitive spirit that can lead to a toxic mindset of needing to see other’s lose, in order to allow us to win. Be it that last second free-throw or watching others struggle in general; the mindset is that you want your opponents to falter for your own gain.
But what happens when that mindset infiltrates normal life?
Well, we still need to be somewhat competitive in life to be ‘successful’. Job interviews require you ‘winning’ against others and that will require, in some part, your competition failing in comparison to yourself. It involves you highlighting your strengths, which becomes a highlighting of these weaknesses in others.
But there isn’t always a need for this competition, whereby you are directly competing with others.
Be it cars, houses or holidays, society has drilled into us the need to compete. Social media ‘likes’ effectively force competition and that’s a large reason as to why I no longer use Facebook. A quick aside, this decision was reaffirmed recently when dining out. A couple on the table next to me sat without conversation for 10 minutes, instead dedicating their focus solely to their phones. Their dinner was served and they instinctively asked the waitress to take a photo of them with their meal. Big smiles, etc. and the photo was taken. They ate their meal in silence and then left. But I suppose it got them the likes they craved on their relevant social media platforms. Behind that snapshot always lies a different picture.
So why do we seek to build down, rather than up? A lot of it is to do with us looking for validation by comparing ourselves to what others have. We do not seek to enjoy the now, instead looking constantly for what we can have next. We judge our own possessions and achievements by who else has them, or can have them.
Instead of judging our own worth by comparing to others, consider how our own worth makes us feel. There is no greater feeling in life to be contented with life. Seek contention in what we have, rather than what we think we need to make us happier.
Knowing more, to feel less…
The plague of likes, comments and followers has reached such an epidemic crisis point that Instagram is said to be considering the opportunity to see your algorithm-controlled social feed with that data hidden. But the beast has grown too large to curtail. We now know more, but feel less.
The social media generation get their value and worth from the numbers underneath their posts and pictures, rather than from what’s contained in the filter-filled images. Turning off the ability to have the apparent appreciation for these posts published to all, will only lead to greater feelings of a lack of worth. After all it’s better that we know the tree was seen falling and ignored, than not know if the tree was seen falling at all.
As a society we’re now programmed for a need to know more. Not more relevant information, but instead more irrelevant information. We are inundated with pictures of dinners, holidays and celebrations, without any of it being directly relevant to our lives. We seek this information to validate our own existence. Are others’ lives better or worse than ours? How can we promote our own lives to appear better than what we have already seen from our peers on these sites?
We have people eating out in restaurants with loved ones and families, documenting the occasion for the benefit of those not even there – potentially those who we only really pseudo-know. The whole process of going to dinner is to give an opportunity for a break from the norm; a break from the inundation of technology. But instead of enjoying this break, we seek to continue the technological enslavery and utilise this opportunity which was designed to allow for more face-to-face interaction – away from phones, tablets and television – to further the social media persona that we feel a need to develop.
We have a generation of teenagers who are more interested in engaging in digitalised interaction when out socialising in the real world; oblivious to the message they are sending out to those around them. Rather than devoting their attention and basic manners to those who have chosen to spend time with them, they are far more concerned with messaging those who have chosen to do otherwise. The same teenagers are avoiding interaction with their family elders when in their presence. Their focus and attention is on everything but those who won’t continue to live for as long as them, but they’ll be sure to continue to commemorate them online when they do pass. Funerals and deaths are after all, social media fodder.
The internet has given the world the opportunity to know so much more about the world. But it has also given us the opportunity to know more, but feel less worthy because of this developed knowledge. Instagram’s potential change could be a positive step, but the beast of validation via social media has already far outgrown any cage that it could be placed back into.
What even is it to be ‘mindful’?
A little while back I was offered the chance to try a subscription to the app Headspace on the recommendation of a friend. The pretence was for it to assist with a busy working life and give the opportunity to clear space within the mind.
With some reluctance, I tried it…and really liked it – well, on the occasions I didn’t fall asleep whilst meditating!
The premise is simple. Control the breathing and think about things, without actively forcing yourself to think about them; as odd as that may sound. I completed the courses linked to appreciation, self-confidence (recent dreams seem to indicate a lack of this) and understanding about emotions, all of which were interesting and engaging. From there I’ve looked to further the philosophical side of thinking about the bigger picture and turned to podcasts.
One that I’ve become a big fan of is the Joe Rogan Experience. Rogan is someone I have been aware of from his involvement with UFC, but I’ve got to say that I’ve found his podcasts fascinating. Often he’ll explore, with the help of a wide range of guests, the idea of being mindful. One of the big messages I’ve taken away recently from his session with Russell Brand, is that ‘this is only a temporary thing’. This being life. And he talks about the need to ‘eek out as much goodness as possible from it whilst we’re able to’.
In a society now where we’ve become obsessed with ‘what next?’ we’re forever forgetting the need to appreciate what is happening now. Right now. None of us knows how much time we have left, or how much time we have left in the current state. We don’t know what the day could bring, or even what that phone call could bring. Rather than worrying about how things could turn out in the future, we need to focus on how things could turn out in the now.
Embrace the day and eek out all the goodness that you can from it.
What when motivation is lacking?
I first set up this blog as a cathartic exercise. A chance to unburden some of the thoughts and feelings that come to mind, as and when they do. It’s worked. The posts put up so far have helped with the meditative process of exploring the thoughts that come to mind. Perhaps that’s why I’ve not felt the need to post in a while.
Until now.
For as long as I can remember I’ve always been involved in sport, largely through being part of a team. The camaraderie and friendships that have been built over the years cannot be understated. Teammates have become friends and I would not have it any other way. But now, the older I get, the less important the element of sporting competition has become. Training and game nights have no longer become a climactic focal point of the week; instead almost becoming a nuisance.
The need to go toe-to-toe on the sporting field has weakened and I would like to think that this is due to the necessity of winning becoming less important as life and its priorities change. But there is a nagging doubt that it’s because the task of winning has simply become more difficult with age. I’ve seen teammates succumb to retirement and consider that it’s potentially on the horizon for myself. It’s not something I’ve thought of until the clock ticked on the wrong side of 30 and I’ve long been of the mantra of ‘you’re a long time retired’ so have always sought to look to extend any opportunity of playing sport. But right now there is half a season left and no desire to commit to it in the manner I would normally expect. Though I am not one to quit halfway through a job, so the games will be competed, but whether the mindset is right for them remains to be seen.
The motivation to travel on a weeknight and face off against old foes is waning. A more sedentary life is looking more appealing, but that’s a slippery slope to begin down. Easing out of a sporting lifestyle will impact on the normal lifestyle led. I’ll no longer be able to kid myself that it’s fine to have treats in the diet because I know there’s at least two hours of high intensity sport being played each week. Add into that the convenience the activity provides to catch-up with friends, and it’s a perilous double of an increased waistline and withdrawn friendship opportunities that comes to the fore. Neither of which are conducive to the reality I wish for.
It’s time to remember – You’re a long time retired…
Why not be positive?
Having sat, awkwardly, around a table last New Year’s Eve being questioned about what the new year will bring and what fraught resolution I would come up, I vowed this year to be prepared.
This year the decision was made to attempt to introduce a more positive state of mind going forwards.
Sure it’s a platitude that is trotted out regularly, but it’s also one that has provided a great deal of thought for me recently to consider what the benefits could be. See, having always been a pessimist, and not ashamed to admit it, it had become a label that had become synonymous with my name. A big decision was mooted at work and I indicated that I was receptive to whatever choice would be made by the collective. “Of course, nothing bothers you does it?” It was a statement that resonated with me. Often it’s tough to allow others to gauge a reaction from me, either positive or negative, because of the facade that I mentioned in previous posts. An unwillingness to show emotion, means an inability to allow others to see they’re harming you. That too needs some working.
Though it’s also something that has cost me in encounters. People perceive a lack of happiness because of an inability to express emotions and this, to an extent, comes from the pessimist thought that ‘at some point, things will go wrong.’ So 2019 will be the year of change with a mindset.
It begins when we wake up in the morning, clinging onto the covers to bemoan the start of a new day; but that day is filled with purpose. We have responsibilities, tasks, interactions to make across that day and all of these come from ideas of trust that others place within us. These are things we should feel positively about, rather than complaining about the alarm clock raising us from our slumber.
We look in the mirror, taking ample time to attempt to find the things that are wrong with us. We don’t look for the positives, we’re trying to identify the negative changes in our appearances – forgetting that we are blessed with the power of sight to be able to see these images. We may become more wrinkled, but that too should be appreciated for the experiences that we have undergone. Not all changes as we age should be seen as the negative process of aging.
Having coached youth sport, a key idea I have attempted to impart upon those working with me is that ‘you learn more from failure, than you do from success’, but at a certain point we lose this idea in life. We no longer seek to identify learning opportunities in life and at work, instead identifying them as weaknesses and things that could lead to further problems. Working through these concerns give us greater experience going forwards, meaning that we become a knowledgeable member of the team for others to come to for assistance when they too first encounter a similar problem.
So that awkward resolution point, a forced opportunity to attempt to make a change, has led to positivity. Rather than presuming or identifying the worst in all that I do, instead opportunities are taken to appreciate the positives. After all, life is what you make it and it can become as positive or negative as your mindset allows it to be.
Why Not Admit Weakness?
From an early age, it’s been perceived that admitting to weakness only serves to make you weaker – more vulnerable. Playing sports will do that to your mindset. A skill you can’t do? Hide it by increasing your ability to do something else even better. An injury? Find a way to mask it, claim it’s something else inhibiting your play. But what is the end result of this? Well, the weakness remains as a weakness.
But what about in real life? Weaknesses appear in every aspect of life. I like the idea that we learn more from failure than we do from success; but let’s be clear, everyone wants to be successful regardless of how that success is measured. Nobody wants to be seen as unable to complete a task, either at work or around the house. We want to learn yes, but we also have to admit at first to needing to learn. YouTube has made it nice and easy for us all to pretend that we’re more than capable of hanging that shelf…
However, an inability to admit to a weakness cost an opportunity this week. It’s an opportunity that will repeat itself, but it was also an action which could have led to no further similar opportunities being presented. The reason for this was because admitting to a weakness is hard. We all want to be perceived in some specific manner and identifying to others that there may be more going on behind the scenes than we outwardly demonstrate can be tough.
So I took a chance. Putting faith and trust into that significant other, the weakness was admitted to. It was explained, discussed and rationalised. It was explored and linked to the current, rather than solely being focused on the past. See, we want things from people without explaining how that can be achieved. We don’t want to be hurt, but we don’t let others know what it is that they should avoid doing to prevent hurting us. Ironically, by showing weakness, things have become stronger. A developed bond has been created and going forwards to the same issue shouldn’t be repeated.
Like with the first post, a weight was lifted and things felt clearer and brighter. With the facade lifted, the reality looks promising.
What Next? 