I was at home earlier today, all comfy cozy. Just having gotten done watching a movie (The Martian, which was rather good if you’re looking for something to watch), I was thinking about what to do next when I had the sudden urge to go to Starbucks and get a coffee and do some reading.
The idea of going there and reading with a hot coffee certainly wasn’t new to me. Nor unique. I go there quite regularly as a matter of fact. It’s a nice atmosphere and a relaxing place to get some reading done. What was weird, though, was how late in the day it was for me to do that. You see when I normally go it’s right after my regular weekend breakfast at Mia’s Cafe. So I’m heading there around 9 am or so. And here it was about 1:30 pm. But the urge was there so I decided to follow it.
I got there and it was a little more crowded than the 9 am crowd generally is. A little noisier than it would usually be for me as well. But I had driven there so I might as well make a go of it. I got my coffee and sat down to read and got a few pages in when two older gentleman sat down in the chairs beside me and started talking. It wasn’t too distracting so I kept reading when I heard one of them say “yeah, I’ve always wondered what Alaska is like.”
Mind you I wasn’t listening in. In fact I had been doing my best to tune them out. But the statement had caught my attention because I’ve lived most of my life in Alaska. So I put my iPad down (all my books are on the Kindle app) and said, “excuse me for interrupting, but what did you want to know about Alaska?” This started a wonderful conversation that lasted over an hour. And by the end I had two new friends, Mark and Fred. It was wonderful.
And all because I listened to the little voice inside my head. If I had argued with the little voice and said “it’s not the right time”, I wouldn’t have had the situation. Same results if I had just ignored it altogether. But instead I listened. Instead, I took the advice it offered. And now I’m two friends richer and quite a bit happier. A little happier still realizing right now how much Mark and Fred enjoyed the information (they learned a lot about Moose).
Sometimes things just pop into your head and you don’t know why. Maybe every now and again you should just listen, too. If you can’t think of a good reason why you shouldn’t, just do what the little voice suggests and see what happens. Maybe you’ll be two friends richer, too. Maybe you’ll be straight up richer. Who knows. But unless it’ll actually hurt to try, why not do it? I hope you’re having a great day today. I know I did. Peace.
We’re all familiar with the phrase “nobody likes a quitter.” It’s said like it’s an absolute. Under no situations should you quit otherwise you’ll risk alienating yourself from others. Of course we understand there are exceptions. You won’t be looked down upon if you quit smoking. In that case being a quitter is fine. Mainly it refers to tasks you start that you should, in “nobody”s opinion be able to complete.
Well I’m not a big believer in “nobody likes a quitter.” I’m more inclined to side with another common phrase “know when to say when.” You see there are many occasions when knowing when to quit is actually a good thing for you.
Anybody who has watched Wheel of Fortune should get this. How many times have you seen a contestant with a decent amount of money spin the wheel again because there is still money to be made. And how many times has that decision ended in ruin when they hit the bankrupt wedge on the wheel. That person didn’t know when to say when.
Now I’m assuming in most people’s lives the Wheel of Fortune example won’t be particularly relevant consider the very small percentage of the population that winds up on the show. So what would be a more relevant example for the average person? I’ll give two that happened to me in the last week.
First, I was doing a jump rope workout and it was going pretty well. And then I tweaked my left ankle. And that’s my “bad ankle.” I was born club footed there and the surgery to correct it has left it a little weak. That makes it easy to tweak. Now the “nobody likes a quitter” group would tell me to cowboy up. No pain, no gain. But in reality I was feeling pain for a reason. Now sometimes I feel the pain and it goes right away, so I kept going for a little longer. But the pain didn’t go away. So I knew it was time to stop. I quit because I listened to my body. It was telling me enough. If I kept going, which I could have done, I risked making it worse. And then I might be affecting other areas of my life if I couldn’t walk because I injured my ankle. I knew it was time to say when.
Second, I fast regularly. It isn’t a problem for me. Usually it isn’t, anyway. But the other day I felt something I don’t usually feel anymore. Hunger. Being keto adapted my body can generally find all the energy it needs from my onboard fat storage. So fasting is pretty easy for a day or two. This time I hadn’t even reached a day and I was struggling. Now I didn’t just give in the moment I felt hunger. I gave it some time. Drank a glass of water to fill my stomach. Played a video game to take my mind off of it for a little while. The hunger didn’t go away. So having done what should have gotten me past a psychological craving for food I knew my body was telling me a fast was a bad idea. So I quit. I don’t know why this one was difficult, but my body was telling me it was.
In both cases I made an effort to continue. I’m certainly not arguing you should stop at the first sign of trouble in whatever you’re trying to accomplish. But if you’ve given it a good faith effort and you’re still getting the signs that you need to stop doing what you’re doing, then quit. It’s ok. There’s a reason you keep getting the sign. Not quitting and soldiering on might seem courageous, but your mental “check engine” light comes on for a reason. And just like ignoring the one on your dash, you do so at the risk of making things worse.
So know when to say when. Even if you think people will be disappointed in that decision. Because in the end it doesn’t matter what they think. You’re the one who has to live with the consequences of your decision. So make the right choice and quit when you need to. Waiting until you’re forced to just isn’t the right when. Have a great day. Peace.
There used to be a show on I loved to watch called American Gladiators. The show had many events all of which were designed to pit weekend warriors against the professional gladiators. The idea was simple, compete in an event against the gladiator doing the best you can and if you did well enough you’d get points. Collect enough points and out score your fellow weekend warrior and you won.
Each individual event had its own challenges. Powerball required you to be fast, but also agile. You had to meet the dual goals of getting soccer balls into the baskets and avoid being train wrecked by a gladiator. Or Assault, where you had to advance toward the gladiator who was shooting tennis balls at high speed your way. Get hit you were done. To take it up a notch you’d have to stop at certain stations to attempt to shoot and hit a target located right behind and above the gladiator. Assault required you to stick your neck out to make the shot. The event I’d like to focus on today is Hang Tough.
Hang Tough was simple in concept. You start on one platform holding onto a gymnastics ring. And then you’d swing from ring to ring, attempting to land safely on the platform on the opposite side of the field. There were a couple of minor hiccups, though. First, you were working against the clock as you were holding up your entire weight by the hands as you went from side to side. Anyone who’s been on a jungle gym knows that the longer you go the more tired your arms get. If the warrior’s grip gave way before he or she reached the other side they’d fall and lose the event. Oh, and there’s the small issue of a gladiator coming your way on the rings from the opposite side, intent on taking you out. And I don’t mean dancing.
The rings were spaced such that you could reach the next ring while still holding on to your current one. You didn’t have to let go until you were assured you had a good grip on the next ring. But the presence of the gladiator could rock that boat. Sometimes you’d have to quickly move from the one ring to the next and couldn’t test your grip first. And on some occasions the warrior, in an effort to dodge the gladiator, would have to let go of one ring before even grabbing the next.
Life can be like Hang Tough. It’s nice when you have the time and energy to go safely from one life choice to the other. Being in a position where you can test your “grip” on the new life event before releasing the past one is awesome. But sometimes life throws you a curve and you’re left with a decision. Go before you know, or stay the steady course and risk the gladiator.
Maybe you get lucky and dodge the gladiator safely. Maybe you get lucky and the gladiator’s grip gives way before yours. If you’re not so lucky and the gladiator catches you, now you have a lot of extra weight on your shoulders to deal with. The gladiator, and life, try to drag you down.
Then again maybe you’re that person who decides to be bold and go for it. You understand the risk. If your grip isn’t true you fall. But if you grab that next ring securely you’re past the danger and on your way to victory. You just have to be willing to assume the risk and live with the consequences.
The consequence, of course, being you fail, and fall. Cool thing about Hang Tough was that many a warrior fell, but all would go on to compete again. Failure was embarrassing. A bit regrettable. But never fatal. So they’d pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and get right back to competing.
What set the risk takers apart from the guys who played it safe wasn’t so much that they’d take the risk, it was the understanding that even if you risked it and failed, you still could come back and succeed.
So remember this week to Hang Tough. And if you’re the risk taker, do so boldly, knowing that as long as you’re willing to accept the risk, even if you lose you can still win in the end. Have a great week. Peace.
Here is this week’s vlog. It’s about letting the Universe help you by listening and allowing. Leave a like if you enjoy the video. Feel free to comment here or there about what you think. Agree or disagree. Subscribe and click the notification bell if you want to be immediately notified every time I post a video on YouTube. Have a great week. Peace.
So I did hear back from them today. The guy who called was not one of the ones who interviewed me. He told me I wasn’t chosen for the job at this time. There was some good news in it. While I had went to the open interview based on a news blurb on a local TV station, I hadn’t really gotten a chance to look at a job listing. So I did have some questions that I wasn’t able to ask in the format of the interview I went to.
I know the company will put out another notice for hiring soon, so this time I will get to read the notice. The notice will hopefully answer my questions.
The other bit of good news is that while I was turned down, the guy who called did offer this information. The ones who did interview me had told him to make sure to tell me that I should keep an eye on their Facebook page. I should do this because they would be having another job fair/interview session soon. They told him to pass along that I should definitely come back and interview again.
I don’t remember exactly the words the gentleman used, but I was definitely left with the impression that if I came back again the next time they were hiring, I would be getting a job. Might be reading into it, or hearing what I want to hear, but it’s just how it sounded to me.
The big thing about the whole situation is that, while I of course would have liked to hear that I got the job, I didn’t react negatively to the news. I accepted that I hadn’t been chosen, and that there was likely a good reason at this time for that. I’m doing better at realizing things happen for a reason. I don’t always get to know the reason, but there is a reason.
So I will continue to do some job hunting. I got a new application in today. I still have a couple of outstanding applications for jobs nearby where I already work. So, despite today’s bad news, things feel like they’re moving in the right direction. As I get more news on my job hunting journey I’ll post it here. So for now, I’ll bid you a good day, and I’ll see you soon.
We have a lot of decisions to make every day. At what time will I get up? What will I wear today? What will I have for breakfast? And I could spend the next few minutes rattling off examples, but you get the picture.
If you’re going to be making all these decisions, you’re going to want to make the best decisions possible. Decide to get up too early, and you needlessly miss out on some sleep. Decide to get up later, and you run the risk of not catching back up the rest of the day. Wear something more formal, and you could feel over dressed all day. Not formal enough, and you could feel awkwardly under dressed. Eat the wrong first meal, and you may not have enough energy for your day. Eat too much and you could gain weight. So how do you make the best decision possible?
Think back to some of the decisions you’ve made recently. When you made some of them, did you get a feeling of unease or dread? Or did you feel calm and peaceful about the decision? That’s your internal feedback system trying to help you out.
You see your mind, where you make these decisions, is easily swayed by whatever logic you want to attach to your decision. It’s the ultimate Yes man. It knows when you are “deciding” whether or not to have that third donut that you’ve already decided to have it. So it starts presenting you with the logic of why it’s ok, maybe even good, that you eat the donut.
But there’s another part of you that knows the honest answers. You can call it your intuition, your sixth sense, the voice in the back of your head. Whatever, you call it you’re talking about the internal feedback system. It’s not really interested in what you want. It’s looking out for what’s best for you. Because somewhere in your head there’s a part of you that wants to succeed and knows how to do it. You just need to start listening to it.
How do you start listening to it? The same way you focus in on any sound that’s hard to hear. First you get things as quiet as you can, in this case by calming your mind. Perhaps by meditation, or even just as simple as stopping and taking a breath. Then you focus on the voice. The more you pay attention to it the louder it becomes. It’s like when you hear a noise in your room. At first you just know it’s a sound in the room. But when you focus on it you get a clearer picture of where it’s coming from until you hone in on it and discover the source. The last part is to make use of what the voice is telling you.
Think about this. If you had a friend who always wanted your advice, but never did anything you advised, how motivated are you to help? You’ll probably stop trying. Your internal feedback system is the same way. If you constantly ignore it, the system just doesn’t try as hard to help you out. But when it knows that you take its counsel seriously, you’ll hear it loud and clear all the time.
If you always listen and do as it tells you is your life guaranteed to be perfect? Of course not. Your inner voice isn’t perfect, it’s just motivated to do what’s best for you. But the more you use it the better it’s decisions get. And the better you get.
So in the week to come, every time you make a decision stop for a moment and think, “How does this make me feel?” If it makes you feel good, trudge right on forward. If it makes you feel a little queasy, maybe keep thinking a little longer for a better decision. You’ll know when you hit it because it’ll feel right. Happy decision making. And have a great day.
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