It’s a new month and the start of a new challenge. Before I start on this one here’s a quick update on my challenge from last month.

The challenge I set myself for January was to finish writing my book. The update is that I didn’t finish and I haven’t written as much as I’d like but I’m so glad I set myself the challenge because I am much much further than I was or would’ve been had I not done this experiment.

The upshot is that setting yourself a deadline on things you’ve wanted to do, but put off for quite sometime, is the perfect way to give yourself the kick up the butt; how else are you going to get yourself to take action?

When you do the challenge make sure you tell people and get them to hold you accountable.

The main aim is to make progress. It doesn’t matter if you succeed or fail, just that you get started, keep going, and get as close to your target as you can.

With my book I’m nearly at the point where I’m ready to start sending sample chapters to publishers and that was more important to me than completing it.

Challenge For February

Initially, the challenge I wanted to do in February was observing 30 days of silence but because of the way things have unfolded and the extra shows I’m doing on my radio station, I’ve decided to postpone it until a later month.

So I had a think about a conversation I had with fellow comedian Hyde Panaser and also fellow blogger Arvind Devalia regarding encouraging other people to adopt this idea and concept of doing a 30 day challenge.

So I thought why not use February to see how many people I could get to sign up to doing a 30 day challenge for March. My goal is to get 1000 people to commit themselves to taking on a challenge for the Month of March.

Why not make a commitment and do something you really want to you? Is there a task you’ve put off and would like to accomplish?

Have you always had the idea of writing a book and never done it?

Do you want to be paint drying watching champion? (Yep, they actually have that now!)

Whatever it is, use this opportunity to get started and I’ll be more than happy to support you.

I don’t want to create a tribe just for the sake of it. The whole point of this is I want to show you that you can make a massive shift in your life if it’s something that you’ve been meaning to do for a long time.

You will have to make sacrifices. You may need to put off a few smaller insignificant things (Like your children perhaps? [kidding]) but in the long run it will be truly worth it.

The other benefit of creating this tribe is so that you will get to know several people who are attempting the same thing as you and you will have the opportunity of supporting each other.

What are you waiting for?

If you want to join me in doing a 30 day challenge for the month of March leave a comment below to join me.

You can do anything you like so long as it’s something significant for you and will make a big impact on your life or make a big contribution to your community.

After getting an iPhone, Angry Birds was the first game I got hooked to.

I’ve completed, and almost 3 starred, every single level on every flavour; Seasons, Rio and the original Angry Birds.

There is a good reason it’s #1 in the App store and has been for some time!

Some might call me a an addict, but definitely not as much as this crazy kid!

I’m not really an addict but whenever new levels are released I’m curious to see if I can clock them.

There’s a lot I’ve understood and related back to real life by playing this game. Lemme s’plain…

1. It starts off easy – When you first start playing the levels are easy. It can seem hard though as you have to learn the rules of the game. You have to learn exactly how the controls work and what the objective is but, once you do, you’re in full flow.

2. It gets harder – As you progress the challenges get harder. Remember, if they didn’t the game wouldn’t be as much fun. If it didn’t give you a challenge you would get bored. Sometimes you’ll get stuck and hit a level that you just can’t beat. At those times it’s worth asking for help.

3. Sometimes you need hints – When you get stuck, you have a choice of remaining at that place for a long time, it will be rewarding to find the solution by yourself but it can take time. The alternative is get help from someone who’s been there before. When you do you’re trading in the gift of solving it by yourself but you do give yourself the gift of saving some time. Whichever method you choose is entirely your call. There is no shame in the short-cut.

4. With persistence and patience you can crack any level – It just takes commitment. If you opt for the option of solving it by yourself then you have gained something that you don’t get through any other means. There were times when I was stuck but I saw it through to completion. It was frustrating but extremely rewarding. What it ultimately gave me was the means to deal with any similar stumbling block.

5. Perspective – When you go back and try the early levels, you realise how easy they were, even though they seemed tough at the time. You think “how did I ever get stuck on those?” It makes you realise just how far you’ve come and how much you’ve learned.

6. There are hidden treasures – If you pay attention and explore you will find things that are hidden away. They are only there for people to find who really look. You may occasionally stumble across them if you’re lucky but when you really pay attention you find the bonuses that most people don’t stick around to find.

7. There’s more than one way to skin a cat (or more aptly, kill a pig) – You’ll complete a level one way but if you want to, you have the option to see if you could have done it a different way. There is never just one solution or just one answer. The first time you might have used three birds to complete the task and believe it could not be done with less until, you try again and realise you could’ve just done it with one.

8. Perfection isn’t important – It doesn’t matter how you get the job done. So long as it gets done. Sometimes you’ll get it done in a way that seems immaculate, other times it’ll be a hash job, but that’s the most important part, getting it done so you can move on!

9. There is no end – A truly great game has no end. I completed the original version the first time and thought “woooohooo” but then they released Seasons and also more levels on the original. So just when I thought it was over, it begun all over again. (I’m glad it did.) There is never an end, just a continuation in one form or another, so just enjoy the game, because there are always more levels to come.

10. Stealing baby birds is just plain wrong – When will the green pigs ever learn that they should never mess with birds and their babies!

Editors Note: This is an outstanding guest post by Zeenat Merchant-Syal of Positive Provocations

This past few months, I found myself in the middle of a personal crisis. Things were changing, growing, and expanding. Many of the goals I had set for my life and my business were manifesting. At the same time, new opportunities were presenting themselves and it was becoming challenging to keep on top of it all, to have clarity about which were the right opportunities to pursue and which weren’t. And things were happening at a pace that I wasn’t entirely comfortable with.

I was starting to notice the warning signs that something wasn’t quite right. My life was starting to feel chaotic, a feeling I don’t like, and out of control, a feeling I definitely don’t like. It was beginning to feel like my life was running me, that these changes and new opportunities were taking on a life of their own and I was merely coming along for the ride. I was having a hard time making decisions about my life and my business, and I wasn’t happy about it all.

So I decided to take a break. I was going to get away from it all and spend some time revisiting both my life and business plans. This was something I had found invaluable in the past, taking the time to clarify my goals, my priorities and my vision for my life. Having a plan and a vision had helped me to achieve a great deal of success in many areas and to stay on track in the past. So my plan for my “break” was to re-work my life and business plans. The Universe, on the other hand, had other plans.

And that was my first mistake. My break was going to be a “working” break , at least in part. Never mind that I hadn’t had a real break in a very long time. You know, an actual BREAK, time where you don’t work at all, where you just relax, kick back, and enjoy yourself. A time out, to renew your body, mind and soul. But it was okay, I rationalized. I needed to re-work my life vision, it was important. And I was still going to get a break because I wasn’t going to work on anything other than my life and business plans. I wasn’t going to answer business email, work on the blog, or any of the numerous tasks I could still do while I was away from the office. And I was only taking my computer along to work on my business and life goals. Yeah right. A nice little story to tell myself to be sure, but deep down I knew better.

And sure enough, the very first night, within hours of my so called break, I was trying to access the internet to check my email. You saw that coming didn’t you? And that’s when the Universe stepped in. While trying to access the internet, my computer just shut down.

Hmmm, not good.

But without thinking much of it, computers do sometimes freeze up and do odd things, I went ahead and tried to restart it. Much to my horror, each time I tried to reboot, I got an error message. One I had never seen before. And nothing I tried to get my computer up and running again worked. It wouldn’t even boot up in safe mood.

Uh oh. Really not good.

Not knowing how to solve the problem and fearful of perhaps wiping the hard drive if I did the wrong thing, I gave up and shut the computer down, and decided to deal with it later. And that was my first breakthrough.

In the past, I would have panicked. I would have felt the need to do something about this situation immediately. Even if it was impossible to do something about the situation right then and there, I would have stressed and worried over it all night long and continued to try and fix the problem. Instead, I decided to leave it alone until the next day when I would try and find a place that could either fix the problem, or at the very least recover my files from the hard drive. Whatever the problem was, there was going to be a solution, and it didn’t have to be addressed right that moment. Whoa, what a breakthrough! So I put the computer away and spent the rest of the evening relaxing with my little girl and a book.

The next day, I had an even bigger breakthrough. I decided to do nothing at all about the computer, at least for now. It could wait. I could live without it for a week. I was on a Break after all. I was comfortable with the realization that whether I took the computer to a repair shop that day or a week later, it wasn’t going to change the outcome. And besides, I knew the truth, if I got the computer fixed that day, I was going to try and work on more than just my life and business plans. I was going to try and get caught up on a lot of other work stuff I needed to do. And now, I couldn’t. As for my life and business plans, I could work on those the old fashioned way, with pen and paper if need be.

So now I was back to the original “plan” for my break, to revisit my life and business plans and try to relax a little too if I could fit that in, but I wasn’t going to work. And that’s exactly what happened.

Well, not quite.

As I said, the Universe had other plans. I prefer to type rather than use pen and paper for a variety of reasons. Without my computer, I wasn’t in any hurry to start writing down my goals, my priorities, etc. So I didn’t. Instead, I spent the first full day of my break eating, sleeping, reading, and just relaxing. And that is exactly how I spent the rest of my break — eating, sleeping, reading, taking walks with my little girl, and just hanging out in the house. I didn’t think about any of the choices I had to make, the changes that were happening in my life, or what I thought I should be doing. I let it all go and thought about — nothing. And the most miraculous thing happened . . . .

When I came back from that Break, I was crystal clear about what I wanted, where I wanted to go, what changes I needed to make, what opportunities I should and shouldn’t pursue, and most importantly, what was right for me. Crystal, clear, clarity. All from doing nothing.

Tweaking Myself

Not only was I clear in what was the right course of action for me to take, it became clear to me that it wasn’t my life and business plans that needed to be tweaked, it was me. My life and business plans, goals and objectives were still aligned with my life vision. However, when you are constantly ‘in motion’ whether that be physically, mentally or emotionally, you can get off center, and loose sight of your priorities and your life vision even if it’s staring you in the face — my life vision and my business goals and objectives hang over my desk where I can see them every day. It didn’t matter. I had lost my center and the ability to clearly and effectively make decisions and choices that were aligned with my life vision. I was allowing myself to be pulled in other directions by the wants, needs, goals and objectives of others. After my ‘time out’, I was back on track, able to stay centered and focused on what was important for my mental, emotional and spiritual well-being and the success of my life vision.

While working on a life and/or business plan can be an invaluable tool, and can help us to stay focused and to manifest our goals and objectives, sometimes, we just need to stop and do nothing, to allow ourselves time to return our center. Whether we take a vacation, or practice daily meditation, or a daily break, we need to take the time to get away from all the things that are trying to pull us in a million different directions all at once, including our own thoughts.

As to that computer problem. Well, it seems “doing nothing” worked there as well. The last night of my break, I was lying in bed and suddenly the answer just popped into my head. The next day, I pulled out the manual, followed a few simple steps, and fixed the problem myself, saving me the cost of taking it to someone else. Had I continued to try and fix the problem myself when my mind wasn’t clear and I was stressed and anxious, I could have very easily made the situation worse and done something to the computer that was irreversible such as wiping the hard drive. Instead, doing nothing initially about the problem, allowed time for my thoughts to settle, for my mind to work the problem out on it’s own, in it’s own time. In this case the answer was how to solve the problem myself. The answer could have just as easily have been to take it to someone else. Either way, doing nothing allowed me the opportunity to gain clarity about how best to proceed in order to minimize my damages.

Now two months later, it is time to revisit my life and business plans, to tweak them to fit my changing vision and goals. And I will, but not while I’m on my regular break.

About The Author

Zeenat Merchant Syal is a Practicing Counseling Psychologist/Spiritual Counselor/Motivational Speaker & Naturopath with degrees in Motivational and Counseling Psychology & various fields of Holistic and Naturopathic Medicine.
Her blog Positive Provocations focuses on Positive Thinking through Healing the Mind, Body, Heart &Soul-Spreading Positivity, Motivations, Inspiration, Love & Happiness.

Subscribe to her blog updates by RSS or Email. or Follow her on Twitter

I don’t pretend to be a life coach that knows all the answers. I don’t pretend that I always do everything right or always make the best decisions. Sometimes I feel scared; shock horror! Somebody call the papers, a life coach who’s admitted his fear!

I get things wrong and I do sometimes feel lost. No one is above or beyond those kinds of feelings no matter how much they pretend.

This week I was made redundant from work. Even though I’m only 33 I’ve been working since I was 15. That means I’ve been in the rat race for over 18 years. This is an unusual time for me as this coming Monday I will no longer have to wake up and get ready to go to work. It’s definitely a weird feeling when it’s something you’ve been doing for so long.

Although I know I have a bigger purpose, I have yet to decide what I’m going to do now that I’ll be out there on my own. I have plenty of ideas of things I’d like to do, but I wanted to see what people would say to me, knowing where I currently am. This is where I’d like to invite your ideas, coaching, suggestions etc. based on all that I do.

There are certain things that will definitely take some adjusting to. I will no longer be getting a fixed monthly income with benefits. I will no longer have a set routine pattern that I will have to follow. I will no longer have to travel into the office. (Even though I only used to drive a few miles!)

Of course, I don’t just see this as an ending, I see this as a beginning with new opportunities. I know this means that I will no longer have to answer to a particular boss.

However, entrepreneur or not, I’ve always believed that there is the concept of service. Regardless of whether of working for someone or myself, I will always answer to my clients. Whether that be in the form of my coaching clients, or entertaining an audience, I will be always be doing a form of service.

Taking into consideration that I’ve been coaching for 6 years, doing radio for over 3 years, doing comedy for over 2 years, and have been writing for over 5 years, I need to turn these skills into in a model allows me to generate an income from it. I want these things that I love doing, my hobbies to become my livelihood.

With all that mind and all that you know about me, what would you ask me and what steps would you recommend I take? I look forward to reading through your suggestions and answers.

A huge merci beaucoup to jturn for the picture.

Welcome to my latest video blog on how to solve any puzzle in life. It was quite a challenge to do this video as I had to multi-task; something the male species are generally poor at!

It was difficult to focus on what I was saying as well as solve the Rubik’s cube at the same time.

Like a Rubik’s cube, all of life’s puzzles, problems and challenges can be solved by following a series of algorithms. When you remember the algorithm it can be applied multiple times to a whole host of different circumstances that you will encounter.

Enjoy the video!

Key Points

1. Once you hit the point of rational thinking i.e., you have gone beyond the blur of rage or chastising yourself, then you can being to ask the questions that matter like “how did this happen?” or “Did I do something wrong or was it a genuine error?”

2. You can then ask yourself how to get beyond what happened. How did it serve you? When you understand that then you’ll move beyond it.

3. Finally when all the pieces have come together you’ll be at point where should it ever arise again you’ll feel familiar with the steps and be at a stage of almost unconscious competence.

And Finally…

If you’ve ever wanted to learn how to solve a Rubik’s cube but have never been able to here’s a great site which shows you how, step by step.

You probably won’t get it the first few times but with practice and patience you will get there. Just keep persisting and you will get to a point where you will almost be able to do it blindfolded. After that you might even feel ready to take on the challenge of the almighty 7x7x7 cube! :-O I’m off to Ebay to try and find one!

Photo credit: mercredis

When faced with a challenge or a conundrum, most people will look to change the circumstances in order to change the result. I don’t believe that works. I believe the cycle will repeat until you’ve truly understood the situation and its origins. You will truly get a idea that you haven’t if the situation repeats itself in your life. This is a massive clue. I’m not perfect and things are repeating in my life and it’s because of that, the result that has led me to sit here and write this right now.

A common repeated scenario I hear from women is ‘I keep falling for the same type of guy’. A common one for the guys is ‘I keep moving too fast with a woman and realising I don’t love her’. Or from both sexes: I want to change career because I’m not happy where I am. The simple problem here is that not many people ask why?. They never get to the bottom of the reasons for the repeated results. However, there is a caveat to all this and it actually takes precedence over finding the why, and it’s extracting the gift and declaring the thank you.

Finding The Gift

The thing I want to make clear here is that this is not just looking for the positive in all situations. There is positive and negative in everything. Often our perception is lop-sided. The key here is getting to a point where you truly understand the gift or opportunity the situation has given you. I want you to truly look deeper and find the in what way has that event served you? Maybe you were being oppressed by a person with a stronger will than you. Lets look at that more closely.

Yes they were bitchy to you, yes they were mean to you. What gift did they give you? Was their actions in some way making your will stronger? Did the situation teach you to fight your corner? Did their constant bullying make you more resilient?

Lets take another example. Have you been moving from one job to another only to find you haven’t been enjoying them at all? That wherever you go you feel the same way? What gift can you extract from that situation? Maybe it’s a simple as having your eyes opened to that fact that your life is not meant to be about working behind a desk doing a 9 – 5 for the rest of your life? Maybe it’s to show you exactly what you don’t want to do.

Another example: You might have a persisting pain in your body. Maybe the gift is letting go of your stubbornness and finally going to see a doctor to get it fixed. Maybe it’s to give you a higher pain threshold. Maybe it’s to learn to meditate to heal yourself.

Get the picture?

There is no right or wrong answer in what you will take away or extract from the each situation. It’s just up to you to open your eyes and look. Keep looking, keep digging, don’t just stop at finding one or two things from each situation, find 20 gifts. Push yourself until you feel genuinely grateful for that event manifesting in the first place.

Your challenges will follow you until you extract the gift and declare you thank you.

To Summarise:

1. Know that you challenges will follow you and may just change form.

2. Go through the process of extracting the gifts and declaring the mistakes

3. You have a choice – repeat this process? Or, repeat those events. It’s your call.

While I was in india, although I was busy running around a lot of the time, I found myself with periods of time where I had not much else to do. I didn’t have the usual internet access. I couldn’t blog; I couldn’t speak casually on the phone to my friends; I didn’t feel like watching much TV and even though I was reading and writing there was only so much I could do before I would eventually tire of that too.

Even that period, without all the things I’d grown accustomed to, was an interesting challenge in itself. It’s a wierd experience to suddenly drop everything and have none of the usual creature comforts to hand. So I decided to try something different which is why I decided to create this video blog. It wasn’t my intention to go down the route of video blogging but it was basically the only creative outlet I had. With my trusty iPhone, I started recording!

One thing I mention in the video which you’ll hear me talk about the challenge of digging yourself into deep comfort zones. You might be a strict vegan for example, or be an early riser, what happens when your circumstances change beyond your control? That’s why I’m a grateful that I’ve kept a flexible attitude. I’m not a strict organic vegan freak; which came in handy in india as I didn’t see anything labled as organic. I prefer to wake naturally rather than at a set time which combatted the jet lag. All those attitudes came in handy when thrust into a place where I had little control.

Keep a flexible approach to life. On that note, enjoy my video blog! It was just over 11 minutes so I split it into two parts. There is a third bonus video too with a bit of treat for you if you’re a fan of magic!

It’s a wonderful feeling to be back to blogging after being away for just over a month. Those who know me well will know that I just went through, what I would describe to be, the most challenging experience of my life.

My mother became critically ill in India and it was a real mission dealing with everything and most importantly trying to get her back home. During the time I was out there though many people came forward with help in all guises and I can’t thank you enough for that.

There were many twists and turns to this story and it isn’t quite over yet but it was just a miracle to see people, even strangers, offer help to provide some sort of solution. We were offered many prayers and regardless of what you believe, I know that the power of silent prayer offers much help to those who need it. Even if you feel like you can’t offer physical support, always offer a silent prayer of support. I believe it makes a world of difference.

I haven’t done quite as much writing within the last few weeks as I’d like but, believe me when I say, I am never short of ideas. When I don’t act on a flash of inspiration or the spark of an idea immediately I find I lose the buzz of it very quickly. Anytime you have a flash, act on it quickly. To not do so is denying your deepest inner guidance and voice which is showing you truly who you are and what you desire.

I’ve also had an abundance of ideas and haven’t been able to get them all down on the blog as yet so I was thinking why not try something a bit different? This post is 7 articles in 1. (A worlds first maybe? ) With that in mind this post so easily could’ve become 5 – 10,000 words and so it was a challenge to keep this all within 2000. I guarantee though that this post will have something for everyone and will challenge the way you think about certain things. So, scan the headlines, find a topic you like, and peruse!

1. Unleash Your Uncommon Sense

I was scanning the news recently and came across and article whereby the police gave a ticket to a man for blowing his nose whilst his car was stationary in traffic. In the UK you can given a ticket over something like that under the charge of driving without due care and attention.

We had this debate on my show and it wasn’t the only story of its kind. I asked myself if common sense had been lost. What is common sense? If the actions of today’s society is anything to go by then maybe what is needed is not common sense, but uncommon sense!

Following the norms of society and what we’re told is not working and we need new paradigms in thought. Maybe the status needs the quo taken out of it! I’m not talking about anarchy. I’m talking about challenging conventional thinking. If something doesn’t work, change the approach. That’s not a hard philosophy to adopt. Shift your thinking and ask yourself if your actions are just because that’s the norm or because you’ve done it with conscious elevated values in mind?

We are a great species, a wonderful race, and it’s about time we started thinking that way.

2. How To Let Go Of People

People will come and go in your life. That’s a fact. Sometimes you will outgrow people and people will outgrow you. It’s nothing to be afraid of. This is just part of the journey of life. When some people go, others will arrive and fill a different area of your life. I still maintain that we are all connected and an extension of one another.

Learn to let people go gracefully. Understand when a relationship is no longer serving you. Some will see that as running away from something, some will see it as moving away from something that wasn’t good for you in the first place. No one can decide that for you. It’s a decision you must come to alone through your belief about the situation. Are you fixated on whether your belief is right or wrong? It’s neither; it’s just down to how you choose to perceive it.

3. How The Media Try And Sway You And How To Become Immune

Take a close look at the two following news articles:

1. Happiness wards off heart disease, study suggests

2. Be lucky – it’s an easy skill to learn

There’s a distinct difference between the two. The first is reported news on a study. The article is given the spin it needs to attract attention. That’s ok, we writers do that; we would be fools not to. The problem is that there are so many of those articles that very often they contradict each other. As an example, on a regular basis you will see contradictory articles with regards to alcohol, some say it will benefit certain things, others will say it is bad for such and such.

You have to come to your own conclusions on such things. Research can only guide us so far and as the title clearly says it is only suggesting the idea; remember that! Don’t take that knowledge at face value. It is only an indicator. With the specific article I’ve referred to, It’s doesn’t take a genius to realise that happiness helps the health overall. Saying happiness does anything otherwise would just be totally stupid.

So long as it’s genuine happiness and nothing forced I think it’s pretty safe to say that your health with benefit. Maybe we can chalk that one down to common sense! I actually laughed out loud when I read the part that said: “They could not categorically prove happiness was protective, but said people should try to enjoy themselves.” – Well duh!

The second article is a firsthand account of research and is pretty fascinating. It’s still not absolutely conclusive and should not be taken as gospel but the experiments are clever and gave a very clear indication that you can make your own luck with a simple shift in thinking. It’s a clear and definitive message to those who truly believe that they have bad luck that they can change it.

Do you see the clear difference between the two? The media often try and sway the opinons of the masses through such spin. See through it, don’t just be one of the masses.

4. Great Minds DON’T Think Alike

I’ve never liked the saying that great minds think alike. They think alike in the sense that they all follow a specific pattern to attain success. They don’t actually think alike though, they think very differently; hence their greatness.

They look at what is and ask ‘what if?’. They look at what isn’t and ask ‘why not?.

To be a great mind all you have to do is look around you, find out what the world needs, look at what inspires you and then find how you can bring those two universes together. What unique talent can you bring to the world? Your talent may be similar to others, but I promise you it is unique.

5. How To Be Frugal With Your Communications

I did a communications sabbatical last year and have since trimmed down on the amount I communicate with people. I have now totally stopped using IM’s like MSN, Google Chat, Facebook Chat and Blackberry Messenger because I found them to be a huge distraction. It’s wonderful that we have so many options through which to communicate but there’s a side of me that wants to communicate less.

People got offended when I stopped keeping in touch as much and it wasn’t anything personal. It was just a personal choice I made. We often pressure ourselves so much to be good friends and always satisfy the needs of others. Keep in touch, but not at the detriment to your own wellbeing.

With so many forms of communication it’s very easy to become a little bit overwhelmed. Choose your methods of communication wisely. I know of people who only use Facebook to keep in touch with very close friends. Others completely stopped using it and I was considering closing my account today. I realised I don’t really need it. As far as I’m concerned this blog, twitter and my phone are more than enough.

I don’t have the opportunity to miss people anymore.

I like it when I don’t speak to people in a while because when I do we have so much to talk about. Regular communication has its benefits too in that you can go incredibly deep and get to know people on a very intimate level.

I do keep in regular contact with my close friends and it’s is ironic because, when we don’t speak for long periods, it feels like no time has passed at all and we pick up from where we left off. There are no questions about why it’s been so long. We don’t make each feel guilty about the fact that it has been a while.

6. How To Fully Immerse Yourself In Your Comfort Zone

There are two types of comfort zone:

1. Being in a situation and feeling so comfortable that you take no risk even though you desire change.

2. Entering a new situation and feeling comfortable because you understand how to be your true self.

The latter is the one I want to talk about. Have you ever been in a situation where you were so comfortable that you felt totally at ease? You were surrounded by strangers and yet you felt like you could totally be yourself without feeling the need for any kind of pretence. You might possibly have felt that way when you were surrounded with close friends and family, and as a result, you personality sparkled. Would it not be awesome if you could replicate that amongst strangers?

You can! There are many techniques to do so. Anchoring is a great one to begin with. Next time you feel that comfort, Anchor it. The next is to simply practise. Put yourself in that situation often. Get comfortable with strangers. With practise you will arrive at that place naturally. Those are the two main ones, if you want more, just ask!

7. Understanding The Nature Of Trade Off’s

In this day and age everyone is directing their consciousness towards being environmentally conscious. What most people don’t realise that no matter what path they take there is still a cost. So you are saving resources by recycling, but the recycling process is creating waste and using additional energy. We may drive more environmentally friendly cars but those cars require many resources to build in the form of increased energy and materials.

I’m not saying that we don’t have to care for our planet, what I am saying is that you may think you’re doing good but the truth is that there is so much more to be done. If we are going to make a truly global change then we need to think on a much larger scale and think much further into the future.

I remember seeing an episode of Star Trek TNG when the crew realised that using warp drive was causing tears in the fabric of space-time. It was a great episode and it was a reflection of what we’re doing now, but on a universal scale.

So whatever you do, be aware that it isn’t the solution you think it might be. Understand the costs and start thinking about what else can be done. How can we as humans take a different stance or different approach to make sure we look after this small home of ours?

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I know I’ve encompassed a lot in this blog post but I sometimes feel like if I don’t get this stuff out it will go to waste. I would love to hear your thoughts on all the topics I’ve written about today; what do you think?

Photo by Masood1226

P.S. Imagine being a passenger on that train!

Change is faced by all of us on a regular basis. The passing of a loved one; redundancy from a job; a relationship break up. Sometimes you won’t see it coming, and there’s often very little you can do about those events to prepare, except to accept them. What about the ones you do see coming? Like those times when you say to people “I knew that was going to happen”.

Things may be going really well in your life and you might be in a position where you don’t want anything to change. That is the time when things are most likely to change. Will you be able to cope with those changes?

You might hate your life and want things to desperately change. That is when things are more likely to say the same.

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew.

- Abraham Lincoln

Let me start by saying that uncertainty is a good thing! If you were certain about everything all of the time life would bore the knickers off you! Change is something that is happening all the time anyway so it’s worth taking the time to step back and acknowledge that where you are right now maybe great, but it is impermanent.

Become a student of change. It is the only thing that will remain constant.

- Anthony J. D’Angelo

You can’t possibly expect yourself to pre-empt every small or big event but by developing an acquiescent attitude it makes that coping with that change easier. In addition to that, it’s wise to start thinking about what you would do should things take a turn for the worse. I don’t think of that as gloomy fortune telling but rather knowing in real life that shit does happen.

If you were to ever step into a corporate office you would know that there is something called ‘Change Control’. It’s a stringent process that is followed because any big changes are made to say, for example, the corporate IT network. It’s perfect for the ANAL-ysts of the world. It basically is a safeguard against any unwelcome surprises like finding your servers switched off one day.

Processes like that are perfect if you are planning to make big changes. It allows you to get to grips with possible outcomes and then plan ahead for them. Even if you don’t know a big change is coming there will often be signals and if you learn to spot them, then the more time you have to prepare.

That is the key. When you have even a small inkling that things may be shifting it’s time to start getting ready for them. Lets say you were facing the possibility of being made redundant at work. Even if you love your job and don’t want to leave why not start applying for new jobs while you still have one or even look into alternative or additional forms of income.

In my experience, people can spot desperation a mile off. If you’re in a desperate situation and come across that way it puts you in a lesser light to someone who has options and has more of an aloof attitude. Besides, what position would you rather be in? Would you rather have options or be totally at the mercy of whatever comes to you?

In the grander scheme of things change is automatic. I got asked in an interview recently if there is anything I would change about the world and the answer is no because change is always occurring. I would however continue to adapt myself in response to the changing world. I believe world will automatically transform as I do.

Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.

- Barack Obama

Take for example Facebook and Twitter. They totally re-wrote the books on social networking and the others had to change or fall by the wayside. Those tools aren’t essential to the survival of mankind…well actually I do know one or two people to whom their loss would mean the end of the world, but in reality they don’t have an impact on our survival. They’re only purpose is to enrich our experience.

Change is inevitable, except from vending machines.

- Author Unknown

Remember all the good things that can come from change too. You might gain new skills; you might meet new people; you may earn more money; you may even end up finding a door way to the dream job you always wanted. I can’t even begin to count the number of times someone has said to me: “‘It was the best thing to happen to me!” It might be the same for you!

The only reason we resist it is because of fear. That fear comes from ideas we build in the mind based on loose experiences we’ve had or heard about. Once you can let those go you open yourself up to a whole new world of possibilities. So remember these points when your life begins to shift.

1. Change is inevitable so make your attitude flexible

2. When you see the signs of change deal it a counter blow

3. Change can be good or bad depending on how you decide to deal with it.

Fear is the greatest impediment to change. – Dr Spencer Johnson

The Experiment So Far

I’ve been on my sabbatical for nearly three days now and it’s been an interesting experience. I was at the studio yesterday morning doing my show and when I arrived I had no internet access whatsoever. I had to do the whole show without any resources. It was a good test to see if I could do the whole show just from whatever came to my head but in the end I decided to get one newspaper and mainly use it for the funny stories for my bizarre news segment.

I could’ve switched on my Blackberry and used the internet but I decided to see what else I could get to hand. Because I didn’t have the internet I couldn’t do simple things like the Traffic & Travel report. I was also by myself which made it especially difficult but I used the time off air to relax and meditate.

I know it’s only been 3 day but since I decided beginning this I’ve found that I’ve become so much more focussed on any tasks at hand. It doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll continue to do this from now on but I do think that there are certain tools I’ll use much less. I will continue to use tools like Facebook and Twitter for personal marketing but I won’t use them as much to socialise.

A few people have said that I’m cheating by using blogging or or evening having an emergency phone. Who am I cheating? I decided the rules of this trial and even if I wanted to there are just certain things I would not be able to escape. I would still have to use email and internet for work and not to mention my work mobile phone. So from the beginning I decided the 3 main things I’d forego would be my Blackberry, TwitFace, and IM’s.

Mountain Climbing

So onto other things. A couple of weeks ago my friends and I went to Snowdownia and climbed Mount Tryfan. At just over 3000ft tall it’s not the highest mountain in the range but is one of the more tricky ones to climb as it requires using both your hands and feet. We managed to make it to the top in about 90 minutes and that was stopping for one break and also taking some pictures by the late on the mountain.

We were so fortunate on the day as the weather was perfect. On the peak we managed to catch a wonderful sunset. At the top of the mountain are two boulders called ‘Adam and Eve’. You can jump between the two but it is scary! I was going to try it but I’d injured my knee so it’s an experience I’ll have to savour for the next time!

Basketball

Last week I went to see the Four Nations Basketball tournament at London’s O2 arena. It was Great Britain Vs Poland and Turkey Vs Israel. Turkey thrashed Israel and beat them by over 20 points. I could see that Turkey was by far the superior side and I had a feeling that they would most likely win the whole tournament (which they did).

Great Britain lost all three of their matches over the weekend. When I was there on the Friday all the Great Britain supporters defected to support the Polish side during the game. The GB team just seemed as if they just lacked the necessary discipline to even play at a similar level to the other teams. It was my first time going to see a live Basketball game; something that I’ve always wanted to do!

Wedding Speech

On Saturday I did my speech at my friends wedding. If you didn’t already see it I put up my article last week on my top tips and writing and making a speech. I didn’t do as well as I’d hoped but there were some good things that I took away. I didn’t memorise the full speech so I kept the script with me in case I needed to refer to it.

I got someone to record the speech so I could play it back and learn from my performance. One of the biggest things I took away from it was the use of my tone. That was one area where I felt I lacked that certain ‘something’ to give the speech an even greater impact. I’ve taken something away from it and that’s what counts the most. I know the bride and groom appreciated it too which is the most important part of all. I was nervous beforehand but once I was on stage the nerves disappeared. I managed to keep my voice steady and made good use of the pauses. I’ll put a snippet of the speech onto YouTube at some point in the near future.

Asian Woman Magazine Article

Last week my article came out in Asian Woman magazine. I was asked to write the ‘he says’ portion of a the ‘he says she says’ segment. The subject of the article was ‘can you have a relationship without sex?’. I wasn’t sure how to approach this subject in the beginning as my views on sex are very liberal. I only had 400 words to play with and truth is there’s only a very limited amount you can convey within that space. I decided to just be honest and say what I felt. Although it isn’t a full picture of my beliefs but it does give some indication of what I believe about sex and relationships.

It was new experience for me writing for an international publication and also being limited to 400 words. That was a great challenge in itself but so far the response to the article from people who have read it has been good. There are plenty of people who didn’t like the article which is great news for me as it means I didn’t write something which was just a bit status quo but was also something that was bit more controversial and sparked some discord within people.

The last thing I wanted to end on was just mentioning this story on the BBC website which I’ll be discussing on my ‘Backchat’ show on Sunday.. It’s amazing the direction technology is taking!

For those of you on my Facebook you would have already seen my intention to climb Kilimanjaro next year. For anyone else stumbling this blog, nearly 5 years ago I decided to make a huge change in my life and to challenge myself to do something more difficult each year.

Before I continue, those interested in getting more information about the trip go here to the Whizz Kids website. I’m more than happy if people want to do this as a group!

Stay Young!

I decided to make that change because I realised we as humans have developed this mindset that we should do less and less and slow down as we get older. I totally disagree with it! My personal recommendation is do something that challenges you, every few months or every year. It will keep you young and healthy and keep your mind fresh!

I’ve applied for the Marathon and will most likely do that in 2011. For 2010 I decided that climbing Kilimanjaro would be a great way to challenge myself! I actually had this thought many years ago but it wasn’t as much a reality or possibility back then as it is now.

Raising Money

I’ve had this niggly thought in the back of my head recently that’s been questioning the whole ethos around doing an activity to raise money e.g. a fun run. There’s something about it that isn’t sitting right with me. I haven’t quite figured out why but what I do know is that if it’s not challenging then why should people give money for me to do it?

I definitely now find it a bit pointless asking people to sponsor me to do, lets say, a 5K fun run. 5K is easy for me to run now. What exactly does running achieve that warrants people sponsoring me to do it? I don’t know why but I just have it in my head that if people are going to sponsor me to do something it’s got to be something that’s either challenging, daring or totally outrageous!

I remember that I said to people in the past that if I raised £10,000 I’d do the half marathon in the Borat ‘Swimsuit’. Ok, I’d end up scaring a few thousand people but hey, if it’s for charity, what the heck! Even for the last half marathon, to make it even more challenging for me I set a fundraising target and if that target was met, in addition to running the half marathon, I’d also get my chest, stomach and back WAXED!! (Ow the pain!)

When we did our first Humili-Asian we donated all the proceeds to charity. That felt different as we were actually doing something for the poeple giving the money whereas a run doesn’t exactly provide the same levels of entertainment! Even this climb isn’t necessarily doing something for the people donating money but it is a challenge and something I really want to do.

With that in mind I will definitely do the Kilimanjaro trek and the Marathon and raise money for charity but in the future, I’ll probably do something directly for the people offering the money. For me personally, doing a fun run doesn’t cut it anymore. One of my friends recently told me that he needed to raise some money and so setup a prize draw. That to me seems like a much more ethical way of raising the money.

I’ve started a new blog at http://www.unlimitedchoice.org/amitandrahat. This blog is for my Mentee, Rahat and I to post up entries of our progress during his time with me.

Rahat was paired with me through the Careers Academies scheme and I will be mentoring him until he finishes college. It’s a great way for Rahat not only to get exposure to the business world and all other other things that I do but also for me to learn to mentor someone of Rahat’s age and bring our the best in them.

Please do keep up with the blog posts to keep abreast of our journey and find out what we get up to and how we get along!

That’s twice today on two separate radio stations now where an advertisement has been played about the fact that obesity in young people is on the rise and could lead to future health problems.

Weight And Health Issues For Teens

Over the past 5 – 10 years you will have noticed that this has been a pretty strong theme especially with the US and the UK. There were all sorts of chefs and celebrities getting in on the act and trying to do simple things like make school dinners better. Other celebrities were trying to encourage involvement in fitness and exercise.

From what I heard on the radio adverts the trend is on the rise for obesity amongst youngsters and is seeing no signs of slowing down. It seems like no matter what people do the problem is still on the rise.

Focus And The Law Of Attraction

According to the Law of Attraction what you focus on you get and so it seems that we are focussing on the wrong thing and getting back exactly that.

The prime focus seems to be on obesity rather giving options to young people that are more fun than sitting at home watching t.v., playing video games and eating junk food. The answer to me seems very simple in that we have to make the alternatives more fun and more appealing than the sitting at home option.

It’s clear to me that an inactive body and mind naturally turns towards lazy activities like t.v. and quick food consumption. Boredom is also a strong key. Haven’t you noticed that when you’re bored at home the first thing you do is reach for the remote and some nibbles? Do this on a regular basis and it all catches up with you in the mid section and then some!

A Paradigm Shift

Even though I don’t own one I’m a fan of the Nintendo Wii as its quite an active games console and you move around. You can even work up a sweat playing on one of those! Where I think we’re going wrong is that young people often associate bad things to phyical activities often because of the things that they have to do in P.E. at school. Very often they have to do activities which they don’t enjoy and it’s often taught in a way which is enforced rather than something a given choice!

With the London Olympics fast approaching it’s time we changed this mentality. It’s time we gave our youngsters better options with a more appealing stance that would make then naturally want to participate in more sports! As much as schools is a big part of this there are other ways we can get youngsters exercising too. I remember back in the day my friends and I would meet in the park and organise a game of footy! Then, random strangers would come and join in and before we knew, it we had big teams of people playing and everyone just had a grea time!

Simple things like organising a game of footy at the park can make leaps and bounds towards making a difference to the health and well being of our children. Our focus needs to change though! We don’t need to be focussing on possible outcomes of no exercise! We need to focus on a shift in our paradigm and get youngsters out of the house away of lazy temptations! Don’t put t.v.’s in your kids bedrooms. Ditch the games consoles and get out there in nature and have some fun! Even the adults with kids can save money on the gym just by taking your kids to the park and taking a frisbee and just having some fun! That way you all get some exercise and you all get closer too!

Some Suggestions

1) Don’t focus on the obesity and heart disease. Focus on the most fun you can have whilst being outside and things you can do that don’t involve huge amounts of money!

2) Go old school and organise a fun sporting group activity in the park! It doesn’t even have to be outdoors. Even something like bowling can be fun, make you work up a bit of a sweat and a cheap way of doing it too!

3) Make sport in schools more fun and inclusive for everyone! Gymnastics may not be everyone’s cup of tea so offer the youngsters options!

4) Gyms aren’t the only way to get exercise! Explore what you have in your local area in the way of nature or parks. You may be surprised at what you find! You may even find a bike trail that you and your whole family can enjoy together!

5) Look for social sports clubs that you enjoy where you will naturally feel compelled to return to. The people there will keep you motivated and the very act of making new friends and networking will make you want to go back. If the option is there take your kids along or offer to take your friends kids or neices and nephews!

It’s all about the fun!

It’s that time of year where I start pounding the pavement and get my ass ready for the Silverstone Half Marathon. When I did it last year, it wasn’t as if running the half marathon was challenge enough, no no, last year on the same day, in the evening, I also performed Stand-Up Comedy straight afterwards too! I can still remember the pain clearly! The agony of my muscles siezing up while I was on stage and by the end of it barely being able to stand! Lets just say it’s something that I don’t really want to be doing again!

Yes, you guessed it, this year it’s much worse! This year not only will I be running the half marathon; that wasn’t enough for most people, to see me running my ass off for 13.1 miles! No! They also want to see me go through some real pain!

For that my team from the backchat show at the radio station thought that I should do something extra to get money for charity. The suggested the thing that most men would cringe over just thinking about! They want me to get my back and chest waxed too!

Now me, being the stupid bloke that I am, never backs down from a challenge! So here’s the deal. I’ve created my fundraising page here – http://www.justgiving.com/amitsodha. I originally set my target to £500. However, I said to my team, if they can take care of the fundraising and get it up to £1000 then I’ll get my chest and back waxed too! (Pictures and footage will be taken to proove it has been done)

So, here’s my plea: Please don’t donate too much! Sure lets get it to 5, 6, heck maybe even £700 but lets keep it there. That figure will do me nicely! Spare a brutha the pain of being waxed. I’m gonna be running for 13 miles. I’ll be in pain! Don’t make me have to go through pain twice!

http://www.justgiving.com/amitsodha

P.S. The charity I’ve selected to donate the proceeds to is called ‘Children On The Edge’. It was one that resonated with me and hence I chose that one for this event.