Are you getting help?

Have you struggled for years with a health issue?

Are you getting help?

Does depression return again and again?

Are you getting help?

Have you been fighting with your spouse longer than you care to share?

Are you getting help?

Is your performance at work continually sub-par?

Are you getting help?

Is debt crushing you?

Are you getting help?

Do you feel trapped in a job you hate?

Are you getting help?

Is your life lonely and you wonder where your friends have gone?

Are you getting help?

Is a secret squeezing the life out of you?

Are you getting help?

Do you need a break, a rest?

Are you getting help?

Do you feel stuck, like you’ll never get out of a bad situation?

Are you getting help?

All too often we hear that weakness is to be hidden, that we should be able to handle it all on our own.

Weakness is part of being human. No one can do it all alone.

Are you getting help?

If you’re not, you need to. Now.

Please email me if there’s any way I can help.

I am forever grateful that my older brother turned me onto Queen when I was young. The amount of incredible music they made (Keep Yourself Alive, Seven Seas of Rhye, Killer Queen, Somebody to Love, We Will Rock You / We Are The Champions, Bicycle Race, Another One Bites the Dust, I Want It All, Bohemian Rhapsody and soundtracks to Flash Gordon and Highlander…to name a few) is a measure of their unbelievable gifts.

Yesterday would have been Freddie Mercury’s 65th birthday.

One way you can celebrate is to participate in Freddie for a Day. Here’s the explanation from their website:

“Freddie For A Day is a fundraising campaign for the Mercury Phoenix Trust, the charity set up in Freddie Mercury’s name in 1992. It’s fun, it’s slightly crazy AND it raises money to help the charity fight HIV/AIDS worldwide.”

Basically, you ask people to sponsor you to dress up like Freddie – even if it’s just wearing a mustache!

While Labor Day overshadowed it here in the States, you can still join in or put it on your calendar for next year.

However, it is Freddie’s entrepreneurial spirit that I am reflecting on today, that I want to share with you.

Brian May, the guitarist for Queen, wrote an entry for the Google blog to go along with Google’s amazing homepage doodle -  sharing his memory of their unforgettable frontman.

May’s entry reveals valuable insights into Freddie as an entrepreneurial man, as you can see below.

“Freddie was fully focused, never allowing anything or anyone to get in the way of his vision for the future.”

Freddie had a vision for the future that he pursued unrelentingly. I was watching Tony Robbins’ newest video yesterday and he kept referring to the importance of having a “compelling future” as well. Entrepreneurial men must have a vision for their future that draws them, compels them, onward.

I often get caught up in the day-to-day and lose sight of my goals, or lose heart and let my vision for the future fade.

We must create a vision for our future, a vision to pursue, that makes each day burn with possibility and promise.

And, once our vision is established, we need to focus our lives on living it out.

Even if we create a solid, strong, compelling vision for our future, the many distractions of life can blunt our efforts or cause us to lose our way.

We need to continually revisit our vision, to hold it in front of us, to focus our time and attention on it, allowing the unimportant to fall away.

Have a compelling vision for your future and fully focus on manifesting it.

“…be, like Freddie, fearless – unafraid of upsetting anyone’s apple cart.”

Fear often holds us back, limits and defeats us. We might be afraid of rejection, of criticism, of failure.

Being fearless, to me, is the external representation of handling fear well. I’m sure Freddie felt fear, just like the rest of us. The difference is that he took action in the face of his fear, appearing to all other as if fear did not exist.

Acknowledge your fear and take action in spite of it, continuing toward your vision.

“…Freddie was always the one who could find the compromise – the way to pull it through.”

When May writes of compromise, he doesn’t mean that Freddie compromised his vision. Looking up the definition of compromise gives us a better sense of what he meant: “understanding, give and take, meet each other halfway.”

May writes of how Freddie took action to maintain healthy, positive relationships with the rest of the band members. He would be generous and funny and, at times, give a special present. Freddie was aware that his relentless pursuit of his vision would occasionally cause tension and conflict and he worked to repair rifts and grow relationship without abandoning his compelling future.

Don’t leave a tangled crush of wounded behind you in the wake of your pursuit of vision.

Take the time to care for the relationships of those who join you on your journey, helping others with understanding.

“He was daring, always sensing a way to get outside the box. Sometimes he was too far out…and he’d usually be the first to realize it.”

Sometimes it takes going too far to know how far you can go.

Many tend to play it safe, staying in our comfort zones. To create something uniquely new and valuable, it takes going outside of the norm, trying new things, taking chances. It takes risk.

Take risks and test the limits, being aware of when you’ve gone too far, taking responsibility and adjusting accordingly.

“Freddie made the last person at the back of the furthest stand in a stadium feel that he was connected.”

Freddie connected to the people he served, his people.

Entrepreneurial work is made up of a seemingly infinite number of tasks. Creating, managing, supervising, marketing, selling, servicing, revising – even when we have employees to take these over we’re still responsible for oversight.

It’s a sign of the end when we forget it’s all to serve.

We seek to live out our passions and find out purpose in serving others, in creating results that they find valuable, that add to their lives.

In all you do, make sure you connect with those you are committed to serve.

Freddie wonderfully captures the essence of the entrepreneurial man – focused on his vision, overcoming fear, prioritizing relationships, pushing too far at times, but always connecting to those whom he served.

With all these great insights into Freddie’s life, there was one description, toward the end of May’s entry, that struck me most powerfully:

“And he lived life to the full. He devoured life. He celebrated every minute.”

Will your friends say this about you at the end of your life?

Let’s be more like Freddie and live life to the full.

Links:

Brian May’s Google Blog Entry

Freddie For A Day – Fight HIV/AIDS Worldwide

Official Queen Website

(Flickr photo: jeffweese.)

If you’re not taking opportunities to break from the routine, to escape the day to day of normal life, then I’m concerned for you.

Most of us have full-time jobs, families, friends, homes, cars, hobbies, phones, computers and stuff.

We’re constantly juggling our responsibilities: work hard, grow relationships, keep fit, eat right, fix things, maintain stuff, achieve goals, sleep enough.

With such a hectic pace, we need to take breaks from time to time. These don’t have to be full-fledged vacations either.

I’m talking about a handful of hours where you extract yourself from the regular pressures of life so you can breathe, so you can think.

So you can just be.

Take a moment, right now, and check in with yourself and what’s going on in life.

There’s mail to process and bills to pay.

There are things about your home that need fixing, need cleaning, need sorting.

Laundry and dishes need your attention.

Your phone could ring at any moment, propelling you into one of the many conversations you experience each day.

Maybe you have Pandora or Spotify playing as well, a background bed of sound.

All this constant input can muffled our true selves, our deepest desires.

By pausing the everyday norm you have a chance to experience what bubbles up from within, to possible find more of your true, deep self.

So leave everything at home and get away:

• Spend some time in a nearby park.

• Drive to a city you don’t live in and walk around downtown.

• Head to the mountains/beach/plains/hills/river/lake.

• Plant yourself at a coffee shop.

• Take a long drive with the radio off.

• Go someplace you haven’t yet been.

Living in the Washington, DC area, I occasionally head out to Annapolis for a few hours. Since I love sailing and all things water, I’ll wander the town, admiring boats, drinking coffee and writing, eventually taking the water taxi back to where I park.

Sometimes I have returned excited about a project, refocused on an important aspect of my life. Other times I’ve uncovered buried grief that I needed to process. There have been days when I returned feeling peaceful and content, feeling centered in who I am and what I am doing.

Don’t let the hectic pace of life carry you away from yourself.

Take some time and get away.

How are you doing in this area? Finding time to get away? Or realizing it’s been too long?

(Photo by Horia Varlan, Flickr)

A few weeks ago, I was chatting with a friend who shared about a decision he made in the past that, with hindsight, he would do differently. It had come up in previous conversations so it wasn’t a surprise or new information. He was simply relating it to some current situations.

What did stand out was the casual way in which he minimized and justified the experience by defining it as one of the steps to being ‘who and where he was today.’

It was a sudden flash of insight: there is a cultural message against having regrets.

I know I’ve made this cognitive adjustment many times. I’ve told myself that I don’t regret the past because I can’t do anything about it and it’s one of the many experiences that make up who I am today.

I believe this is a mistake.

Regret is an appropriate response when considering an experience we wish were otherwise, especially when our choices were the cause. Regret can motivate us to change our behaviors, to try new experiences, to make the most of the current moment.

There is a valid danger in regret. It is when we bind ourselves with regret like a chain, immobilizing us. We turn to only look into the past, to wallow in our mistakes, feeling as if we’ve taking a wrong turn from which there is no correction.

That is the hurtful regret from which we need to escape.

Let’s first look at three steps you can take to free yourself from negative regrets:

1. Talk to a friend.

Often the burden of a regret is magnified by our sense of isolation. Bringing friends into your experience with give you support as well as provide different perspectives to help balance your own.

2. Focus on the present.

Being stuck looking backward is hardly helpful. By practicing being in the present moment, the attraction of a past regret can fade. Methods of doing this are diverse, from using breathing exercises throughout the day to taking time to go for walks and examine nature to being with friends.

3. Get professional help.

Sometimes our difficulties seem inescapable. Counselors, therapists, and psychologists are trained to work with clients who are having those types of difficulties. I have had several experiences myself with counselors and always found it extremely helpful. Heck, I even ended up getting a graduate degree in Counseling Psychology because of my experiences!

The regret that we brush off as just a “part of who we are” can also be a weight we carry about. Acknowledging and processing our past regrets can provide powerful resolution in the present and empower us to move with optimism and strength into the future.

Here are six steps for being open to processing past regrets for personal growth:

1. Acknowledge a regret from your past and the emotions that exist with it.

It’s okay to say you have regrets. I regret not going on a trip to Europe with friends when I was in college. I regret some job choices. I regret not being more invested in school when I was an undergrad. I regret not keeping in touch with certain friends.

These experiences carry a sadness with them that does not disappear merely by recognizing they are a part of who I am today.

2. Take responsibility and make amends where necessary.

When I look back on the trip and not investing in school, I can see that I was doing the best I could at the time. With a friend I let fall away, I have since reached out, communicated my regret and apologized. I feel that, with the situations above, I have no ‘loose ends’ that are unresolved.

3. Find the wisdom in the experience – what mistakes were made, what you learned, how you would respond today.

I’ve learned to be more engaged in my present circumstances. I’ve learned to follow passions and to ask for help when I need it. I’ve learned that my connection with my friends is one of my most valued experiences and to put more resources toward that outcome.

4. Identify ways your wisdom is and can be applied in the present toward your future.

I apply more attention to adventure in my life (this year I took an 8-day sailing class that was awesome!). I write more notes to my friends and express my gratitude. I seek out and embrace learning opportunities. I focus on work possibilities that center on my passions and sense of purpose.

5. Let go of any burden you carry from that experience, knowing that if it returns you can rework this process over again.

When I think through my past regrets in this way, the burden practically disappears. Yes, the past is not something I can change, but it is something from which I can grow.

6. Share your process with a close friend who will support and celebrate you.

In a way, I’m sharing it with you all here!

I believe that this perspective shift can be empowering in our conversations with one another. Now, instead of brushing off the past by repressing it with the present, we can own our pasts, sharing with our friends and colleagues the lessons we learned that make us a better person today.

Are there regrets that you are now processing? I’d love to hear more about your experiences in the Comments below. Or, if you think this would benefit someone you know, please send it to them or share it using one of the buttons below.

I’m cold.

A few weeks ago I had this dream.

I was driving along the California coast. (I’m a CA native now living in Maryland, just for context.) The ol’ late 70s VW van I used to own was humming along peacefully down the road. The sun was high in the sky, blessing the land with its warmth, revealing that deep blue sky so common out West. Ahead of me the ocean sparkled and shone soothingly.

The world was warm and beautiful and wonderful.

Then I woke up.

It was 7 degrees outside.

I know, I know. Some of you live farther north or are some crazy Arctic expedition and you’re thinking I have no idea what cold is. But none of that matters.

I’m cold.

This year seems different from my near decade of living out here.

Sure, last year massive amounts of snow dumped on us and tied the area up for days. I remember lots of shoveling, wood fires and eating.

This year I think it got cold earlier, quicker and hasn’t let up.

Two days ago I took my dog out in the evening, swearing silently in my head at the biting wind.

I’m cold.

And not happy about it.

So what does this have to do with personal development?

I know our minds create our emotions. That with focused attention we can even change our physical experience of reality.

(Like the time I was caught in a fall rainstorm on my motorcycle. It was cold but I was able to play mental games of imagining warmth and heat where the feeling of cold could be forgotten. It was a fascinating experiment.)

This time, not such success on my part.

Sometimes we just can’t do it.

Growth is not a straight diagonal incline of success. We have our ups and downs.

We get good and bad results. We have good and bad days.

We just want our graphed average to be a diagonal incline of success.

Right now I have a few dips down. Big deal.

I’ll spring back.

Literally. In spring I’ll revive.

In the meantime, I’m doing work in other areas and celebrating other successes.

Even when I’m cold

I know that stack of cash is impressive, but I don’t think you really want money.

Maybe a small minority are spurred on by the thought of clutching a wad of green bills in a raised fist. I have known a few people that see money almost like a high video game score.

Most of you, however, don’t really want money.

You want what money will add or subtract from your life.

I don’t want four hundred dollars.

I want a new Stratocaster (Arctic White with maple fingerboard, please).

I don’t want one thousand dollars.

I want a four-day trip to Maine in the fall.

I don’t want ten thousand dollars.

I want a 30’ sailing sloop docked near Annapolis, ready to sail the Chesapeake.

Hopefully by now you’re doing the same, thinking through your wish list and picturing the end result of having what that money would buy.

Well, I don’t really even want the guitar, the trip or the boat.

What I REALLY want is…

…the spirit of fun a guitar brings, a connection to music and expression, and the feeling the possibility the hovers with the notes in the air.

…the sense adventure and exploration that accompanies a trip, the broadening of awareness, the awe and wonder of seeing natural beauty and the state of relaxation that only comes from being away from the day-to-day commitments of home.

…the opportunity to be challenged and to rise and master the skills needed to sail, to experience the needed narrow focus needed to safely captain a ship, and for my senses to expand as movement of wind and water communicates its secrets to me.

I want the feelings that each item or experience provides.

Understanding this truth, and its specific application in your life, can lead to:

• Choosing work based on talent, passion and purpose.
• Protection against “to good to be true” promises.
• Conscious spending on items and experiences that will provide long-lasting satisfaction.
• Avoiding wasteful spending.
• Investing in free activities that provide the same feelings.
• A life of aligned priorities and actions.

Take some time to sit down and write out each item or experience on which you would like to spend money.

Then, next to it, define the feelings that you desire to experience as a result.

Now make that as your goal.

Because that’s what you really want.

I loved this video when I first discovered it. I have shared it with friends and colleagues and always enjoy watching it again, both for the ideas and artistic expression.

It recently blipped back up on my radar and I want to share it here. Run time is 10:48.

The three factors that lead to better performance and higher personal satisfaction – autonomy, mastery, and purpose – are important to underline.

What I find extremely valuable is how false beliefs lead to ineffective action.

Look at the example in the video.

Before watching it, you might have thought that more pay would always increase performance.

If it was your responsibility to motivate workers, you could try to increase incentives this way and fail again and again.

You think you’re doing the right thing and it’s not working!

In fact, your employees might become frustrated and eventually leave, causing damage to your company.

Once you understand and believe in the power of autonomy, mastery and purpose, you can implement those in your organization and experience the success you desire.

Everyone carries beliefs about how the world works, what they should and shouldn’t do.

Some of your beliefs are in your conscious awareness.

Some of your beliefs are thought to be understood. However, you have internal conflicts that are exhibited in your emotional responses and actual behaviors.

Many are unconscious and unexamined, passed on through family and friends, organizations and media outlets.

All of your beliefs affect how you life your life every day.

The objective is to increase your awareness of your beliefs and then to change the ones that aren’t working.

Once you get the correct information and change your beliefs, you can switch your strategy and get the results you want.

Here are five questions you can ask yourself to start examining your beliefs:

1. What do you believe?
2. Why do you believe in that idea or concept?
3. What results does that belief have in your life?
4. Are you afraid or threatened by other beliefs?
5. Is there another option that you’re not considering that might improve your life?

Have you changed any beliefs and experienced greater success as a result?

Yesterday I brought my dog Jasper home from having knee surgery. (He had a partially torn CCL – the dog version of an ACL.)

The good news is that everything went well, there’s no sign for arthritis or any other issues, and he should be better than ever in three months.

The bad news is that we’re looking at 90 days of severely reduced activity.

This is bad news only in that my dog is a Chesapeake Bay Retriever and is extremely active and intense. As a pup, he didn’t sit down and hang out until he was eleven months! He would constantly roam the house, looking for trouble. I even cancelled my gym membership in order to run with him in the mornings, in an attempt to get him the exercise he needs.

But limiting his activity levels so he can heal isn’t the problem.

The real issue is that he cannot mentally understand the need to slow down and take it easy. That means we have to do it for him and monitor his activity levels.

There are times when imposing restrictions can be very helpful, even necessary, for future growth.

When returning to working out after taking a prolonged break, it’s wise to limit the time and difficulty in the beginning, working back up to previous levels.

When starting a new job, reducing other life commitments can help your focus and speed up the learning curve.

When working through emotional difficulties, your might need more sleep and downtime to allow processing and rest.

When creating an online business, it’s more effective to focus on, implement and master a few effective strategies instead of jumping to every new product that comes through your in-box.

Those are just a few examples of life situations where restriction plays an important role.

Has there been a time in your life when cutting back was beneficial to your growth?

Do you have too much going on right now?

(Click the photo to see more from Robert Chang’s photostream on Flickr.)

I recently came across an interview with comic book legend Alan Moore. He had this to say:

“Everybody is becoming [a superhero]. In the past I’ve tried to say, ‘Look, we are all crappy superheroes,’ because personal computers and mobile phone devices are things that only Bat Man and Mr Fantastic would have owned back in the sixties. We’ve all got this immense power and we’re still sat at home watching pornography and buying scratch cards. We’re rubbish, even though we are as gods. I think the idea that we can all be superheroes if we want might still be contagious…”

Does this resonate with you?

Mr. Moore might be a bit extreme in thinking we’re all ‘rubbish,’ but he is onto something.

Deep down most people long for something more. There is an inner sense of possibility and potential, reverberations of the dreams we carried as children.

Every single person carries a unique combination of abilities and gifts. We all have superpowers, if we could only learn how to unleash them into the world, instead of frittering them away on the mundane and insignificant.

We don’t have to be crappy any longer.

Are you ready to step up and be the superhero the world needs you to be?

The superhero you need to be – to save both the world and yourself?

One way to begin your transformation is to get your copy of the Success Mindset Masterplan by entering your information to the right..

If you’d like more information on how I can help you become super-powered by being your true self, email me and put “How Can I Be A Superhero?” in the subject line.

(Disclaimer and a link: Alan Moore is not my role model and I do not share many of his beliefs and habits. But he has written some amazing comics! If you would like to read the complete interview, you can find it here.)

Yesterday morning I went out for a run and thought I might end up in a fight.

I was walking out to the main street, where I usually start my run, and noticed a young guy walking a little dog.

I noticed him because he was staring at me.

I continued to the main street, crossing to the side the guy was on. I prepared to turn right and start my run.

He kept staring at me, while his little dog took a dump on the grass.

I’ve often found proof that some people in our neighborhood do not pick up after their dog. Since this guy was staring at me, seemingly oblivious to his dog’s deposit, I asked:

“Are you going to pick that up?”

To which I got a forceful:

“Why don’t you mind your own business?”

I stopped walking to reply:

“Well, it actually is my business because it’s my neighborhood.”

I’m not going to quote the guy anymore. Suffice it to say I received some slang, some attitude and some expletives.

And then he told me he had a bag, opening his hand to show me the crumpled ball of plastic within.

He had a bag and was going to pick up after his dog.

But he got upset and continued on his rant.

So I headed off on my run, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the exchange.

What stood out was how his response came from what he thought I was saying, not the actual words I had said.

If he had answered the question, I might imagine his response might be:

“Yep, I have a bag right here.”

To which I would’ve replied:

“Very cool. Thanks for being a good neighbor.”

I thought it over during my run. The guy had some sort of underlying belief that was a lens through which he interpreted my question.

That belief could be:

No one tells me what to do.

Or:

People don’t trust me.

Or:

I always get a bad rap.

Or:

Runners are terrible people.

Okay, probably not that last one.

Whatever it was, it caused him to respond in a hostile and defensive manner, when it all could have been avoided by a simple ‘yes.’ These are limiting beliefs.

The most interesting part is:

We all do this. All the time.

You and I are constantly interpreting our experiences through the lens of our internal beliefs.

Sometimes we’re right on and life continues smoothly.

Other times we get defensive, afraid, hostile, angry, or depressed…to name a few possibilities.

In both cases, our internal beliefs create our external responses.

What beliefs are you holding that make life harder than it needs to be?