I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

While attempting to do my early morning walk/jog (more like walk) last week, I was pursued hot on the heels by a pack of undernourished, mangy looking, yapping and some snarling Bali dogs who attempted to fight my two innocent, timid, well-fed and posh looking Bali dogs; I slid a few times on the gravel that was used as a permanent solution to fill some of the crater like pot holes (won't be long before those massive holes start re-appearing); and I received continuous accolades from the stream of passersby on their motorbikes who beeped and used the universal language of jeering as they overtook me. I wasn't sure whether this was in support of my mission of getting fit and at the same time looking great on the road, or that the jeers were in jest, but I decided to go with the former option. I had hoped to be inconspicuous by wearing dark sunglasses and a cap that I pulled down over my face, so I could hardly see anyone, but my pale white skin must have blinded them and stood out, like a flash of lightening in a dark sky!

While carrying on with my mission of getting fit, in spite of my dogs nervously jumping all over the place and nearly tripping me up on several occasions, my IPOD started playing U2's song 'I still haven't found what I'm looking For'. Quite an appropriate song really. While encountering the obstacles of simply going for a walk/jog in the Balinese countryside, I started wondering "Is this really what I'm looking for?"!

The theme of this U2 song continued when I went on a business trip to Singapore. Mid week, I ran a team development session with a CEO and her senior leaders. I ran an activity to discover their values and over half the group were looking for a better work/life balance. Not a huge surprise really when these people are working in the modern world of crackberries, emails and instant communication.  Technology was supposed to make us more efficient. Instead it's allowed us to do even more work, at any time and any place!

The priority of our values can change in order, depending on whether we feel we are obtaining what is important to us and if we compromise our values, we will feel conflict. To find what we are looking for, it's good to know what is important to us.

If we feel that our work/life balance is being compromised, it's best to do something proactive to resolve this conflict. When it comes to work/life balance, I've now learned that for me it's not a case of finishing work at 5pm. I'd rather call it work/life values, so I know what to focus on at the time. When I'm working, I choose to focus on my work and when I'm with my family I choose to be in the moment with them. As Oprah Winfrey says:-

"I've learned that you can't have everything and do everything at the same time."

If I still haven't found what I'm looking for, then I can listen to what the feedback is telling me and do something about it. What can you do so that your values are not in conflict and that you can find what you are looking for?

Janet



Establish your own work-life priorities on our intensive 7 day NLP programme in Bali this Nov 28 - Dec 4 NoLimits NLP 
www.nolimitsasia.com 

Crazy about Coconuts

Have you ever noticed if you have bought a car that suddenly the same make car appears everywhere? Or that if you have an idea, it seems to grow so that you see further connections?

After being presented with one coconut by my 10 year old daughter last week, suddenly I'm seeing coconuts everywhere! Every time we go out in the car or for a walk we see coconut trees and count how many coconuts there are and we notice the numerous coconut stalls on the sides of the road. We now have at least 8 coconuts in our kitchen lined up for consumption. My brother-in-law who is passionate about eating healthily and keeping fit and is staying with us at the moment has talked incessantly about the health benefits of coconuts. We now know how to open coconuts, have consumed gallons of coconut water (a young coconut can hold up to 1.5 litres of water), eaten the soft, gel like textured coconut flesh (very different to the hard coconut flesh in the old, shrivelled, brown coconuts), blended coconut smoothies and we add coconut oil to our cooking. My brother-in-law re-assures me that we can also use coconut oil to stop our hair going green when we use the swimming pool (a regular challenge that my family and other people with blonde hair have experienced in Bali), as a face and body oil to keep dry skin and wrinkles at bay, as a natural way to lose weight and for our energy levels to soar! It really feels like we've gone crazy about coconuts. Our Balinese staff have been so bemused at us tucking into lots of coconuts and acting as if we have struck gold when they are as common as weeds in Bali, they went home and brought us lots of free coconuts that were simply hanging from their trees.

I used to have a limited perspective about coconuts and now I have discovered a whole new world of information and experiences. It feels like I have opened a treasure chest of valuable health information about the coconut. How has all this happened? To deal with the mass of information surrounding us and avoid overloading our senses, our brains filter what is useful to us.  By focusing on coconuts, I have activated the Reticular Activating System (RAS) of the brain which sets up neural pathways for me to consciously pay attention to them. The RAS has many functions and is particularly useful when motivating ourselves to achieve our aspirations, goals and consciously focus on what we want.

Next time you have a thought, idea or goal to achieve let your RAS direct you to focus your attention. There is a caveat to be noted here, 'you have to know what you want'.  If you focus on what you don't want your RAS will filter information so that your attention is focused on this. If I don't want to be poor, my RAS will focus on this. Alternatively, if I want to be rich, the RAS will direct my attention to finding ways to do this. You can use your RAS to help you focus on your health, wealth, relationships, career, work, studies and what you want in life. If you want to focus on being a better leader, parent, partner etc your RAS will help you to focus and find ways to do this.

Visit Mark Joyner for more of his personal development brain puzzle cartoons.

In the study of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) which is focused on how to most resourcefully use our brain / neurology, there is a saying:

"Attention goes where energy flows."

What can you do to make sure your attention is focused on what you want?

To find out more about the fascinating subject of NLP, join our next Business Leaders NLP Programme in Bali in November. http://nolimits.typepad.com/nolimitsnlp/

Life's Moments to Savour

It's not every day when your child comes home from school and presents you with a fresh coconut. My 10 year old daughter proudly announced that she had found it underneath a coconut tree at the Green School and that it was a present for me. Having been brought up in the Black Mountains of Wales, where spruce trees are more the norm, I haven't got a clue how to open a freshly fallen coconut. My only recollection of coconuts in Wales was at the funfairs I used to go to as a child, where you could win a dying goldfish in a plastic bag, attempt to eat a big candy floss that would stick to your face like a spider's web and then win an ancient, shrivelled brown hairy coconut. It used to be hard enough cracking those exotic things that came from some far away place! When my daughter presented me with this green shell, it felt like being given a box of chocolates in an unbreakable safe. Like chocolate, I adore fresh coconut, but this gigantic, green, avocado shaped nut that had another nut within it and was the weight of a cannon ball, was going to be a tough one to crack. This unexpected moment did make me chuckle though and it is definitely one to remember and remind my daughter when she gets older. There are not many international schools where your child returns home with freshly fallen coconuts and so is something else to admire about the Green School!

Another couple of moments to savour over the last week have been to do with my work.  I ran a Presenting for Leaders workshop with a group of private bankers and then a team development session using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator with a bunch of lawyers from across the Asia Pacific region. Lawyers and bankers? Not necessarily renowned as perhaps the easiest groups of people to work with (apologies for this stereotyping and if you happen to be a banker or lawyer reading this). These talented people, however, turned out to be great fun to work with, highly participative and appreciative.  From both groups I received excellent feedback which was a huge boost for my morale and I was made to feel so welcome by both groups, I instantly wanted to become a banker and lawyer!. These moments of appreciation, interested participation and good feedback are what makes me enjoy my work and life even more.

The vital ingredient to making all these moments all the more enjoyable was by me being in rapport. I could have so easily carried on looking intently at my computer when my daughter presented me with a coconut at my work desk. Instead, I consciously moved away from my computer and desk and showed an interest in what my daughter had proudly brought home for me. By doing this she felt even prouder about her coconut and this made me feel good. With the group of bankers and lawyers, the vital technique again was building rapport. It was good for me to be interested and connected with them for them to be interested in me.

As Maya Angelou said:-

"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

Whether you are talking with a child, no matter what age, or with an adult no matter what age; whether they are your work colleagues, family or customers, it's how you make people feel that is most important. The best and only way to make you and them feel good is to be in rapport.

What can you do to build better rapport with others around you? You will notice that your communication instantly improves by taking some little extra time to be in rapport and you will be rewarded with good feelings / life moments to savour.
 
Janet

Discover more about the powerful techniques of how to be in rapport by joining our next 7 day NLP Leadership Programme NoLimits NLP

For more information about NoLimits personal and professional development, coaching and recruitment services, contact info@nolimitsasia.com +65 6232 2466

Let It Be

It's been a year since we moved our family home to Bali while running our personal and professional development business, NoLimits, from Singapore. Our company philosophy is about 'no limits', infact there's even a pop song called NoLimit (I discovered this through a good friend after I had named the company, remember this?: 2 Unlimited NoLimit youtube) and there are no limits if you put your mind to it and you really want it. In the space of one year we have expanded our business to recruitment and I have seen my life change considerably by living in Bali. Although hair raising and as painful as extracting teeth at times, it has been an amazing experience for us. There have been ups and downs, satifsaction and dissatisfaction, frustration, fun, laughter and happiness all rolled into one.

You may be saying to yourself so what is the title to this blog about?  Why 'let it be'? I've been wondering to myself, now that a year has passed, how I would describe the biggest life lesson from all of this and the first words that came to mind were 'let it be', so intuitively I have decided to go with this title. I happened to be swimming laps in the pool at our villa at the time (if you can call it laps, I have to turn every two minutes as it's more of a plunge pool than lap pool) and I was reflecting on what has been happening over the last few days since my return from holidays in the UK (strange as it may sound, as I live in Bali I have to go on holiday somewhere). One of the bigger frustrations is that I waited a year for our container with our personal belongings from Singapore to arrive to discover a bizarre combination of my favourite black leather jacket, all my cookbooks and a couple of lampshades went missing! As my Bali friend Sarah said there's most probably somebody in Asia who is now sporting a black leather jacket, wearing a lampshade and pretending to be Jamie Oliver! I'm not bothered about the cookbooks or lampshades but I am mourning the fact that my black leather jacket and I have finally parted after all these years together.  My black leather jacket and I go back twenty years ago when I was living in London. It has followed me around Asia for the last ten years. Admittedly I haven't worn it for the last ten years because it's too darn hot but it has always faithfully waited in my wardrobe for that 'one day' when the opportunity would finally present itself. Maybe as in life, what's the point of holding onto things for one day ....... wherever my leather jacket has landed up, I hope it is appreciated and getting some good use now.

So as I swam my short lengths in the pool, turning around every two minutes like one of the Queen's guards pacing Buckingham Palace, I realised that it's all about letting it be. Sometimes we have to let go no matter how close or dear something may be, or how intense or principled we feel. It's best to accept and move on, when nothing can be done about it. As a man in India once politely instructed me, shrugging his shoulders and holding out his arms - I was frustrated I couldn't book an auto-rickshaw on a public holiday (Independence Day) - "This day is to celebrate when we were freed from you," he exclaimed, pointing his finger at me as if I had to take the blame for all the misdemeanours of my colonial forefathers, "and besides this is India." he sighed, as if to say 'you can't expect anything else.'. So I now have 'this is Bali.'  For all it's frustrations and inefficiencies it has a charm and character that I can't help but admire and a calmness that pervades. In the space of one year I have moved from trying to change things, the frustrating things that don't work out the way I want, to a state of accepting, doing what I can to mitigate and moving on with a smile. Life's lessons in Bali have taught me to be more adaptable, patient and to know when to let it be. 

As the words to the Beatles song says:-

"There will be an answer, let it be."
Let it be - youtube

What can you do to let it be and move on?

Janet

For more information about NoLimits personal and professional development, coaching and recruitment services, contact info@nolimitsasia.com +65 6232 2466

Take the First Step

Take the First Step

I've finally arrived back to Bali after a circuitous return from the UK via Bangkok and Singapore. It's good to be back among all my stuff, but in some respects I'd love to run away from my beckoning responsibilities such as unpacking; getting my children back into the school routine; catching up on my long queue of emails which feels like a backlog of planes waiting at Heathrow airport; getting back into the flow of my work tasks and goals (as well as remembering them); scheduling and synchronising my diary with upcoming personal and professional development workshops, coaching sessions and meetings; getting into a healthy eating  routine (went totally out of the window in the UK, although I do believe it's good to eat cream sponges, tasty cottage pies and drink luxury hot chocolates to survive in a cooler climate); summoning up the stamina to exercise again (why is it so much easier to get out of the exercise routine rather than into it?!); and returning to sorting out / finding places for the container of belongings that arrived from Singapore just before I left for the UK (I didn't realise I had so much junk).

There are times in our lives when we would like to abscond from our responsibilities and things that we know we should be doing, but haven't got around to doing. All it requires is taking the first step and then it isn't as bad or as big a task as what we had imagined (apart from sorting out my container full of junk - much worse than what I had imagined). Taking this first step reminds me of the analogy of climbing a mountain. My 3 daughters, my brother and his German Shepherd dog recently climbed the Black Mountains in Wales. Admittedly these mountains are only 811 metres high, but it was quite an achievement to influence my 5 year old daughter, who complained bitterly all the way up, to reach the top, as well as my 10 year old daughter who wanted to know if we could take the elevator when we reached the half way point (she has spent far too much time in urbanised Singapore!). Sometimes there are no quick fixes or easy ways out, such as an elevator miraculously appearing when we were struggling. Once we had started climbing the mountain we were reluctant to turn back no matter what difficulties we encountered, such as my 5 year old daughter who stubbornly lay down like a lead weight in one of those 'you can't move me' positions and refused to carry on.

In life too, it's simply a matter of taking the first step. No matter how hard or tedious the journey may be, it's a wonderful feeling when you finally reach the top and you can look back and admire what you have achieved. Sometimes in life, as on the mountain, you have to go back down. Having reached the summit, you will find that you have all the more experience and know what's ahead of you to go back down. In some instances this is easier to achieve than climbing up to the top. When we descended the Black Mountains, we decided that the best way to get down was to slide on our bottoms. We acquired sheep droppings, purple wimberry and green grass stains en route, as well as being attacked by some gruesome, prickly thistles, but it was so much fun. My 5 year old daughter enjoyed herself so much, she wanted to climb back up the mountain again and quickly seemed to forget all the pain that she seemed to have endured on the way up! Having climbed the mountain once, will give us the confidence to do this again as we learn how to deal with and know what is ahead of us.

What can you do today to take the first step? As Martin Luther King, Junior, quoted:

"Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step."

Take the first step in whatever it is you want to achieve or have outstanding and you'll be surprised how easily you can do it.

Janet

Take the first step by finding out further information from NoLimits about our personal and professional development and coaching services, please contact info@nolimitsasia.com