A couple of days ago I uploaded a time-lapse video of me working on my front yard, doing some landscaping with my John Deere 2320 tractor.
I got a very positive response from people who really enjoyed the video, so today I decided to shoot another time-lapse of me working on the front yard.
Unfortunately my GoPro ran out of battery before I was done, but I did manage to capture most of it.
Check it out here:
As a coach / mentor, often times people seek out my help and mentoring when they are in a really bad place in their lives.
Often times they tell me about a whole list of things that have “gone bad” for them recently, and how their “bad luck” streak just keeps getting worse and worse.
When we get ourselves into a situation where things aren’t going well, and before we can get past the FIRST challenge that popped up another challenge pops up, it may start to feel like we’re on a downward spiral…
… and the reason it seems that way is because in those situations we ARE in a downward spiral!
Pretending like we are not, isn’t going to solve the challenge.
When people get into a downwards spiral, what I usually find is that they are focusing 95% of their attention on all the negative things going on in their lives, and refusing to see any benefits to their situations.
In essence, something happens which they choose (usually subconsciously) to see as “negative” and then they FOCUS on the negative aspects of the situation, feeling victimized, frustrated and angry.
Then, this anger and frustration turns into a state of “Argh! FINE! I’ll deal with this issue.” and they try to solve the challenge by taking “angry action”.
Of course, when taking action from a state of anger and frustration, usually those actions don’t yield a very good result, and do more harm than good!
This feeds the problem even more, and soon after that ANOTHER challenge pops up seemingly at the worst possible moment.
This of course leads to more anger and frustration, which leads to more “angry actions” , which leads to more challenges.
So what’s the solution?
The solution is very simple, yet difficult at the same time.
The only way to get out of a downward spiral like this, is to essentially PAUSE for a moment and to pull your awareness into the PRESENT moment and to look for the positive benefits of your current situation which counterbalance any negative aspects of the challenge.
It doesn’t have to be a huge thing either.
Got laid off or fired from a job? The positive side might be that you now have more free time to work on your business, or to go back to school, or to find a much better suited job for yourself.
Now, the difficult part is in being able to SEE the positive side in the present moment.
Meaning, if you lose a job I’m not saying that the positive side will be that maybe in the future you’re going to find a better job, but until that day comes you’re still in “Man, this sucks!” mode.
What I’m saying is that you have to find a way to see the positive side of the situation in the PRESENT moment, right now, regardless of what happens in the future.
A downward spiral is kind of like a small tornado that feeds off of your frustration and anger…
… and the only way to stop it is to stop feeding it energy by focusing your mind on creating another tornado going in the opposite direction.
Find SOMETHING to be positive about right now, and then amplify that a little bit more…
.. and then a little bit more…
… and then a little bit more…
The hard part is not allowing your mind to jump right back into the negative side which is what it’s going to want to do.
The truth is, is that we’re ALL always in a spiral, either going UP towards our dreams, or going DOWN towards anger, frustration and depression.
Which way you’re going is entirely up to you, especially during times when it doesn’t feel that way.
Today I wanted to do something fun and a little bit different from my usual “Driving with Paul” videos, so I decided to shoot a time-lapse video of me working outside on my front yard using my John Deere 2320 compact utility tractor.
I just finished ripping out some tree roots last week, so now I’m working on doing some digging up of the front yard to try to level and grade it more.
Here’s the video:
I enjoy doing a bit of work like this outside in the summer time as it’s a great way for me to get outside and get some sun, some fresh air, and some exercise, while accomplishing something worthwhile.
What I love about being a blogger and having an online business as well is that while I’m out there having fun and improving my property, my business is running and building itself on the Internet 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, whether I’m working on my business, or outside working on my yard or sleeping!
If you’d like to learn how to build an online business that continues to work for you regardless what you’re doing, click here to learn more.
Are you looking for a way to make money blogging without feeling overwhelmed?
In today’s episode of “Driving With Paul” I discuss how to do just that.
Check out the episode right here:
If you’d like to join my Empower Network team, and get your personalized plan setup and executed, click here now.
I’m a huge believer in visualization.
Not just the type of visualization where you close your eyes and try to see in your mind’s eye something that you want, but rather the type of visualization where you use your imagination to immerse yourself in whatever you’re visualizing with all your senses.
The type of “visualization” where you can imagine seeing something in your mind’s eye, and you can imagine hearing it, and you can imagine feeling it, and maybe even tasting and smelling it.
Just imagine this for a second…
… imagine going to your fridge, and opening the door, and finding a large yellow lemon…
… and imagine taking that lemon out of the fridge, and putting it on a cutting board, and taking a large knife and slicing that lemon right in half…
… and imagine looking at one half of that lemon and noticing that you sliced one of the seeds inside in half…
… and now imagine picking that seed out and just seeing a perfectly ripe and juicy lemon…
… and now imagine cutting away the peel carefully, so that now all you are left with is just the juicy lemon…
… and now imagine taking that half a lemon and putting it in your mouth and biting down on it…
Could you imagine that?
Did you mouth water a bit imagining that?
Could you taste, smell, see, feel the lemon? Could you hear the knife cutting the lemon?
It is this type of visualization which I believe can help us to achieve our dreams.
The more we engage in this type of visualization, the faster we can manifest what we desire.
But how do you visualize NOT having a job?
The challenge with trying to do that is that when we try to visualize NOT having a job, the first thing that pops up into our minds is OUR JOBS!
We start thinking and visualizing in great detail all the things we hate about our jobs!
By doing that, we are doing exactly the opposite of what we want to do.
You can’t manifest what you want, by visualizing what you HATE – LOL.
So how do we do this then?
Well, here’s the trick.
When you’re trying to visualize freedom from your job, stop thinking about your job altogether.
Instead pick 3-10 things that you LOVE and ENJOY doing, an visualize yourself doing those things instead.
For example, one thing I love doing is blogging and creating YouTube videos and music so I visualize myself doing that.
Another thing I love doing is hanging out with my wife and my pets so I visualize myself doing that.
Another thing I love doing is building a painting tabletop miniatures so I visualize myself doing that.
See what I mean?
You can’t manifest what you want to be doing with your life, by constantly thinking about what you hate about your job.
So you have to switch things around in your mind… just completely forget about your job, and visualize what you’d enjoy doing instead.
Don’t worry about HOW you’re going to be able to ever quit your job, or replace your income, and just focus on what you want.
People and opportunities will show up in your life which will help you to get there, but first you have to get good at visualizing what you want your life to look like in great detail.
Visualize what your days would be like if you had the financial freedom to no longer have to work a job full time.
Try to engage your imagination the same way you imagined that lemon.
Make it that real, or even more real than that!
When you can do that, things will begin to shift for you very quickly.
But only if you can keep your mind off of what you don’t want, and focused on what you DO want. 🙂
