In The Blink Of An Eye

My brain is churning this morning, can't put my finger on why but something in my morning reading really struck a chord deep inside me. I have been reading similiar things for the past year but for some reason, reading it this morning got the neurons firing.  I am currently reading the book  How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big  by Scott Adams. This mornings chapter was titled,  Happiness.  In the chapter he lists 8 things that he (and others I have read and listened to) say can help with your happiness in life. I can get behind them and would even promote them to those who might listen. Those 8 things include: Eat right Exercise  Get enough sleep  Imagine an incredible future (even if you don't believe it)  Work toward a flexible schedule  Do things you can steadily improve at  Help others (if you've already helped yourself) Reduce daily decisions to routine. I am curious to what others think about these 8. Do you believe them to be t

As I have approached making changes this year, I began with goals. I have shared in previous posts about SMART Goals and DUMB Goals. Either one works, the point is, you are more likely to succeed if you have a clear target and goal. Then I shared selecting the right "tools" to assist in reaching those goals. There are many tools that can assist us in monitoring our progress towards our goals. There are tools that can track our exercise, our eating habits and pretty much anything else we would like to track and monitor. The real eye opener for me along this journey is that the first two are necessary in working towards our goals but a game changer is creating new habits and routines. If we do not make using the tools a habit, they are not as effective as they can be. What I have focused on more recently is creating a routine that will make using the tools almost an automatic. What I have discovered when I have been able to run the routines on a daily basis is that even

Making sure you have the right tools for the job are always important. My son recently had a birthday and we bought him a basketball hoop. Needless to say, it needs to be assembled. Prior to going to work on it, I looked at the picture to see what it should look like when done (goal) and then looked at the tools needed for assembly. My next step was to make sure that I had the necessary tools in order to reach the goal of a basketball hoop that you could actually shoot on! After setting my goals for 2016, I began reading about and understanding how certain tools can help you work towards and stay on track towards achieving your goals. I have also found that there are more tools available on the web than one needs so the trick is finding the one(s) that work best for you. I have tried some that did not work and set them aside and have found others that are a good fit for me. Here are some of the examples of what I am using to support achieving some of my 2016 goals: Goal : Run 100

The week of Thanksgiving was always a great week growing up in Wisconsin. There is the obvious reason of all the great food on Thanksgiving Day and there was also being around family and the Dallas Cowboys football game! It was also deer hunting season in Wisconsin which led me to our cabin for a few days of hitting the woods in search of the elusive whitetail. On the occasion that one would pass by, I always seemed to have trouble hitting my target. It also made it tougher when they were moving. A moving target is always going to be more difficult to hit, maybe the only thing harder would be no target at all. Unless having no target is easier because....wait, back on point. At work we have targets or goals that we are trying to reach and we spend a lot of time thinking about them and monitoring them. The past few months I have been thinking about my personal goals. Some of those goals include: health, financial, experiences, and more! As I was reflecting on them, I realized that I d

One of my learning's so far in 2016 has been around "victim mentality or victim mindset." Recently I caught myself in this mindset but having an understanding of what I was doing helped get me back on track.  This year I needed to enroll in a class in order to renew my certificate. With enrolling in a course comes the work that goes with it. I believe there are about 6 documents that I need submit, a portfolio and eventually a presentation to make. As the year as progressed, I have fallen behind. Doing their part, my advisors reached out to me last week to check in and offer support. As the week went on I became tired and as the emails rolled in I became defensive, I found myself saying (in my head) some of the following: "Half the things they are having us do don't make any sense." "If they wanted them by a certain time, they should put hard due dates on them." "What kind of support have they given me?" "Half the assig

The quote in the picture below triggered something in me around the first of the year. I began to wonder about how this year could stand out and be different from previous years. Please don't get me wrong, I am very grateful for the years I have lived and the experiences I have been fortunate to have. I have been able to travel across this great country and see some of its most historic and beautiful places. I have a very supportive family, a beautiful wife and kids, a career and even two dogs that don't annoy me all the time. Most years would be difficult to top. I mentioned in my first post that I went out seeking ideas from people in Facebook land on ways to make 2016 memorable. The idea to create a list and have others help generate ideas came from Sir Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Group. To mark his 65th birthday, he announced that he would take on 65 challenges . Following his lead, my list is drafted and the adventure of ticking off some of them is underway.

As the new year came around I was looking for ways to make 2016 different from 2015. I asked people to send me ideas of things to accomplish or try during 2016, started thinking about what I wanted from the year and ways to accomplish those things. I have gone back and forth  for weeks now on how to capture that journey and ways to share what I have tried, learned and struggled with along the way. I finally decided to start this blog which helps me accomplish a few things. One, it will allow me to track my journey and maybe along the way provide insights or inspiration to others. Two, it stretches me. Most of my writing happens in a private journal so this is a stretch for me putting myself out here like this. Three, I should probably do some learning about blogs in general! I have no idea where this will go or how it will go. I hope that it reads as authentic and that readers might be able to take something away from my reflections and apply to themselves. So even though the focus