Inside - Outside

So how are you doing on your goals so far for this year?  Are your changes coming along the way you want them to?  If yes, congrats!  You're doing something only a few people ever achieve in January. If you're not, then don't beat yourself up.  As Scarlett O'Hara said in Gone with the Wind, "Tomorrow is another day!"  Yup, it's another day, another chance to start.  And once you get going on whatever that goal is - it's amazing to see what else begins to change around you. 

I called this article "Inside - Outside" because a funny thing happens.  When you work on changing some external part of you - the outside - your inside changes as well.  I don't mean your organs or blood vessels although if you're losing weight or working out, those certainly improve.  I mean who you are inside begins to change.  You feel differently about yourself and that improved sense of self begins to reflect on everything you do.  You treat people differently (especially yourself), you change the way you look at things, you start getting other parts of your life in orderr.

When you change some internal behavior, what's outside you begins to change too.  Say you've decided to be more positive or to start keeping track of your money better or to learn something new, that ripples over to the more material parts of your life, the outside as it were. 

I think it's all tied up with self esteem.  You can't help but feel better about yourself when you're doing something to enhance your life especially if it's something you've always wanted to do.  One good change leads to another, snowballing and effecting every little corner of your life.

So take the plunge back to that goal if you've slipped a little or take up a new one that's on your list.  Best to consciously focus on one big goal at a time because that's how willpower and focus work best but don't be surprised if you begin to notice lots of other changes going on - inside and outside!

Are you ruled by rules? Are your holiday lights still up?

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not a particulary structured person - someone who does a bunch of things all at the same time. I can't tell you how many times I've been asked this past year if I was ADD.  We didn't have that diagnosis when I was a kid so who knows.  If I am, I'm hopefully using it to my advantage because I like to do lots of things at the same time - sort of multi-tasking squared.  Just have to be considerate when other people are around so it doesn't drive them crazy!

I'm also not particularly rule driven.  I don't have to have things a certain way to be happy.  As long as no one is hurt in the process, I'm pretty good about having no rules about things.  For example, I have a pannini maker thanks to the generosity of Oprah.  When my brother was here visiting one time, he asked if would be ok to make sausage in the paninni maker.  Why not?  Of course!  He said others had rules that paninni makers could only be used for making those sandwiches and nothing else.  Huh?  Really?  Why?  Does the pannini genie show up taking your cheese away?  Why do people have so many rules?  Doesn't it make life more stressful?

Like the fact that all holiday lights must be down by New Year's day or January 6th.  Why can't we leave them up all winter?  Sure would brighten up the dullest time of year and the time with the least amount of daylight.  I understand that real trees become fire hazards and must come down but what about artifical indoor trees and outdoor lights?  Can't more people break the rules and leave them on?  I don't think they use up all that much energy and they are so pretty.  Even if I put mine out the day after Thanksgiving, one month is just not enough.

What else do you have rules about?  Do people have to do things your way for you to be happy?  Or can you be happy with less structure?  I'm not saying everyone has to be a free spirit or that we should have no rules  - that would be chaotic.  But how about a little less structure..and a little less stress.. I love living this way.  That way I get to save the tension, the drama, the headaches for the big things in life, the things I can't choose to be flexible about, like losing again to my cousin's daughter in Words with Friends - again!!!

Oh by the way, I'm sitting next to my pretty little sparkly tree.  I think I'l keep it up til Valentine's Day!

Marianne

Welcome to 2012!! Decide...believe...share!

Well it's finally here.  The year that people say the world is going to end.  Really?  How many times have we heard that before?  I've heard these things my whole life and thankfully, they've never happened.  So I'm certainly not going to spend much time fearing that it all comes crashing down next December.  I'm going to have the best year I can possible muster.  Why not?  That makes sense whatever the end of the year brings, right?

I've done step one in my action plan.  Decide.  Decide to make this year what I want rather than what someone else says it's going to be.  After all, there are so many conflicting opinions about what the Mayan calendar ending means.  I've decided that it means one calendar ended and a new one begins.  Our 2011 calendar just ended.  And it's followed by 2012.  So theirs ends and a new one begins.  I see it as an even better one than the one before it. I believe that it's what we make it to be.

Which brings me to step two.  Believe.  I love that word.  I have it on the back of my Nike sneakers from Oprah.  Believe what you want to believe - not what your parents, society, the media, the Mayans tell you to believe.  See what beliefs work and keep those.  Ditch the ones that don't and replace them with new ones that empower you.  As Dr. Wayne Dyer says - given a choice between two opposite beliefs, neither of which you can be 100% sure is true, pick the one that makes you feel better on a day to day basis.  

And once that's working for you, share what you've learned with those around you so we can elevate our community together.  I believe that 2012 does call for all us all to step and make better choices.  If we want a better world, we each have to do our part because we're all connected in some way.  Even Darwin who is attributed with the concept of survival of the fittest as a core component of man also said that we are hard wired to co-operate and even love each other.  That part got lost in the shuffle but he mentions survival of the fittest a few times and love close to 100 times...

So join me in my action plan for 2012 - Decide to make this your year, Believe that you can and that you either have or will find the tools to do so and my step three, Share.  Share what you know, share the cooperation, the love, the kindness.  And one year from now, we'll be looking back at 2012 from our January 2013 comfortable chairs.

If you can, join me as I share the strategies for a great 2012 on January 10th at 7 pm for a free one hour teleseminar.  Learn more at www.MarianneDouglas.com/seminars.htm.  And Happy New Year!

Marianne