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WHAT IF LIFE WERE LIKE DRIVING A BUS...?

WHAT IF LIFE WERE LIKE DRIVING A BUS…?

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I often wonder how to handle the less pleasant people, situations, and things that come into my life. Knowing how to deal with life’s little annoyances is key to maintaining balance.

My good friend, psychologist and Mindfulness coach Joe Flanders sent me the following article of his on the topic.

 He calls it the life-as-a-bus-metaphor.

“Imagine that you are the driver of a bus (the bus of your life). Whenever you have an experience, passengers get on the bus, whether you like it or not. Some are pleasant, some are unpleasant. You may want the pleasant ones to sit in front and the unpleasant ones to go to the back and remain quite, but it rarely pans out that way.

Sometimes, when you choose to drive toward what’s important to you, some of the unpleasant passengers become upset; they come up to the front and start demanding that you change course.

You can argue with them, but they usually fight back even stronger and the conflict escalates. In the meantime, the bus isn’t moving.

Alternatively, you can give in to their demands and go their way, so they calm down. But now, the unpleasant passengers control the direction of the bus. As soon as you try to head back in the direction that’s important to you, they attack you again, and so on.

Lastly, you can notice all the passengers, invite them along for the ride continue driving the bus in the direction you want to go. In the end, the unpleasant passengers can be pretty annoying when they come to the front of the bus, but they don’t know how to drive, so they never take the wheel.

 Which would you choose?”

You can check out Joe’s website at :

 Mindfulness-Based Tools for Valued Living
http://mindspaceclinic.com/services/mindfulness/mbtvl/

THE EFFORT EFFECT | From Arno Illgner's Warrior' Way Site)

THE EFFORT EFFECT | From Arno Illgner’s Warrior’ Way Site)

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From an article about Carol Dweck (THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE LINK HERE—Summary reprinted from Arno Illgner’s Warrior’ Way Site)

Researcher Carol Dweck’s study asked the following question:
“What makes a really capable child give up in the face of failure, where other children may be motivated by the failure?”
She studied results of a British soccer team to see why the most talented players at the start of the season tended to show the least improvement.

  • The difference seemed to be in the mindset of the person: fixed-mindset and growth-mindset.
  • Fixed-mindset people who attributed their failures to lack of ability would become discouraged even in areas where they were capable. Growth-mindset people thought they simply hadn’t tried hard enough and would be fueled by setbacks. Students referred to their errors as insufficient effort. Those children learned to persist in the face of failure—and to succeed. The fixed-mindset showed no improvement at all, continuing to fall apart quickly and to recover slowly.
  • Common sense suggests that ability inspires self-confidence. And it does for a while—so long as the going is easy. But setbacks change everything. the difference lay in the kids’ goals. “The mastery-oriented children are really hell-bent on learning something,” and “learning goals” inspire a different chain of thoughts and behaviours than “performance goals.”
  • For performance-oriented students (fixed-mindset): want to look smart even if it means not learning a thing in the process. For them, each task is a challenge to their self-image, and each setback becomes a personal threat.
  • Students with learning goals (growth-mindset), on the other hand, take necessary risks and don’t worry about failure because each mistake becomes a chance to learn.
  • How we label things: if some students want to show off their ability, while others want to increase their ability, “ability” means different things to the two groups. “If you want to demonstrate something over and over, it feels like something static that lives inside of you—whereas if you want to increase your ability, it feels dynamic and malleable.
  • People with performance goals, think intelligence is fixed from birth. People with learning goals have a growth mindset about intelligence, believing it can be developed.

You pick which attitude you think is best 🙂 !

MOVING WITHOUT MOTIVATION

MOVING WITHOUT MOTIVATION

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“When running up a mountain you can give up a thousand times. Just make sure your feet keep moving.”
– Japanese Master

Someone asked me not long ago about how to stay motivated after making a big, prolonged effort. The person had just lost a lot of weight and wanted advice on how to continue making progress.

There are a number of keys to maintaining motivation. 

1) Recognize your achievements.

We have a tendency to very quickly take our accomplishments for granted. After working hard and reaching an important milestone, it’s essential to take a minute to appreciate what you’ve done. Drink a glass of wine, stare out the window, and remember all the dreaming and effort that went into getting where you are.
Now’s the time to thank yourself for all the hard work you’ve done.

2) Be kind to yourself.

Sometimes, when we’ve given a whole lot of effort on something, we get a bit fatigued from changing our lives. Recently, I competed (and lost) in the French national kick-boxing championships. I worked so hard to get there, that for two weeks after the event I had trouble getting out of bed. After training twice a day and watching what I ate like a hawk, I ended up not being able to motivate myself for a jog and sitting eating chips and cookies in front of the television.

“What?” I said to myself. “How do you go from turning your body into a performance machine to behaving like a couch-potato?”

The answer is that it takes giant willpower and concentration to change your patterns or go after what you want. If you start to feel tired from the effort, it might be time to let up a bit and consolidate.
Don’t backslide, but tell yourself it’s ok if progress slows for a bit.
Even warriors have to rest.

3) Re-focus.

Rather than getting really worked up about the loss of motivation, take a bit of time to re-focus. What are your goals now that you’ve attained a certain point? Define your new objectives precisely. If you could have your life just the way you want it, what would that look like?

Write down what you want. The first step to attaining your goals and staying motivated is objectives so well-developed you can TASTE them. You have to really SEE what it is you’re working for. Motivation, in this case, comes by itself.

You might also want to check out Chris Pinckley’s book “Reality Creation 101”. This American personal trainer has great advice on how to create the future you want through visualization and manifestation.

Re-energized and re-focused, these three steps should put you back in the zone of pursuing your objectives.

SHIFTING TO DOING

SHIFTING TO DOING

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REPRINTED FROM ARNO ILGNER’S ROCK CLIMBING BLOG
http://warriorsway.com/shifting-to-doing/

As you transition from preparation to action, you move from one skill set to another. In action, you use the doing skill set; you focus attention on acting out your plan. If you drag thinking into doing, you mix skill sets and attention will be diffused between the two, limiting the effectiveness of either process. Remember, climbing includes stopping and moving. Thinking occurs when you stop, at mini and micro decision points. Then you move between them.

Remember to stop and think, OR move and do. Students in the Espresso Clinic learn the mantra, “When you rest, rest; when you climb, climb.” This helps them separate the skill sets of thinking and doing. Heighten your state of arousal by doing a few deliberate exhales. Breathing shifts attention out of your head and into your body and helps you break free.

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For making decisions we discussed how to break free of thinking. Heighten your state of arousal by doing a few deliberate exhales. Breathing shifts attention out of your head and into your body and helps you break free.