The Wheel Of Life

Think of a wheel with 8 spokes – each of the areas separated by the spokes corresponds to one of the 8 key areas of our lives.

The exercise is a simple one, and one that you should revisit regularly as your priorities will change!

Simply draw the wheel and if the outer rim represents 10 out of 10, or 100%, or whatever scale you want to use, take a pen of a different colour and identify where your life is currently.

Wobbly Wheel & Unleashing Potential

If you look at the example below, you’ll see a very wobbly wheel – one that is typical of someone who focuses on work and money and who has sacrificed pretty much everything else! At least they appear to have learned to release their stress though physical exercise or for whatever other reason, are in good physical health!

This now gives you a lot of information that you can use in many different ways. My preferred approach is to simply reflect on how I would like my perfect life to be and ask myself” “How would I like the wheel to be?” For a number of reasons, I may be happy in the short term with low scores in some areas, so never assume you want to be 100% in everything.

Current and Desired Reality

Once you have an idea of what your current reality is (make sure that the first wheel focuses on how things are and not on how they “should be”) and what your desired future reality is, you can reflect on bridging the gaps between the two. Or you can ask a coach to help you through the process.

A tip: It’s often useful to think about where you want to start in addressing the gap. However, if it’s obvious that you are ignoring something where there is a huge mismatch between the two wheels, ask yourself why you are avoiding tackling this one. There may a valid reason. Equally, you may be avoiding the issue – highlighting and discussing this may provide insights for you.

This is where a coach or a skilled friend can help you – they won’t let you off the hook!

Wheels Within The Wheel of Life

You can construct these wheels for lots of different purposes.

For example, you may be thinking about a new job or even about setting up a new business. You could create a wheel where each spoke represents an important skill or area of knowledge relating to what the new job will bring you or about setting up and building a strong, sustainable business.

Plot where you are for each spoke and it provides the basis for an action plan that will tell you what needs to be done, what you can/should do themselves, and where you may need help. A very simple wheel might look like the above example:

In this case, whatever your current wheel looks like, the next step is to create a new wheel for each of the three areas: Authority (your perceived area of expertise), Innovation (your offering and how it differs from your competition’s) and Marketing and Sales.

Wheels Within Wheels When Unleashing

In fact, here’s some homework for those of you wanting to build your  business: Create 3 wheels as described in the previous paragraph and write out a plan for building your brand, creating products and services and for marketing (which in our context means getting new clients).

If you get stuck, or have any questions, write them in the comments box below.

In conclusion, we started with a Wheel of Life, which will give you a lot of material for self-reflection. We then took one of the areas, work, and broke it down into it’s own wheel. This in turn was broken down into 3 further wheels, showing how there are wheels within wheels within wheels. You can then go on to create wheels within wheels for each of the other areas of your life.

While the Wheel of Life tool may be simple, it will generate a lot of opportunities to help you in unleashing potential.

In watching how other people operate, and in examining what I’m doing, I’ve come to the conclusion that there is one mistake we make that is bigger than all others – it’s to do with where we place our focus.

Do You Need to Change Your Focus?

It should be on the clients – their needs, their fears, their wants, their expectations, their values. Sometimes, though, we fall into the trap of focusing on our needs, fears, etc. rather than honouring the clients’.

This manifests itself in many ways – some blatant, some more subtle.

Obvious manifestations are the trainers who repeatedly deliver the same material, even if they’ve agreed something different with the sponsor. If there are any questions about this, the answer is usually a variation of “I changed the content to more fully meet the participants’ needs.” We all have to do that occasionally but it’s interesting how often some trainers do it!

Another example is the coach who is distracted by a sudden thought about having to go shopping on the way home and whose thoughts then follow that line rather than being fully present for the client.

Or the consultants who have learned a particular methodology or model and who set about applying it in all contexts, with all clients. “if all you have in your toolbox is a hammer, every problem will look like a nail”.

More subtle is the trainer, consultant or coach who uses highly refined questioning skills to slowly move clients down the path where the former wants to go. The solutions end up being very generalized.

Be Careful of Imposing Your World View

I remember back in the 1990s when the big 6 consultancies always ended up with their clients “discovering” that restructuring was the answer to all of their problems!

However, it is also very easy for a trainer, coach or consultant to very innocently impose their world view onto the client, in effect contaminating the client’s story. How? In the words we choose when summarizing and paraphrasing what our client is saying to us!

This is where “Clean Questions” come in. They originate in David Gove’s discipline of “Clean Language”.

Clean Language

Client says: “I’m feeling stressed”

“And is there anything else about …?”

•  “And is there anything else about feeling stressed?”

“And what kind of … is that …?”

•  “And what kind of feeling confused if that feeling stressed?”

“And where is …?”

•  “And where is feeling stressed?”

“And what happens next?”

•  “And when you are feeling stressed, what happens next?”

“And then what happens?”

•  “And then what happens (when you are feeling stressed?”)

“And what happens just before …?”

•  “And what happens just before you feel stressed?”

“And where did … come from?”

•  “And where did feeling stressed come from?”

“And that’s … like what?”

•  “And that feeling stressed is like what?”

“And what just happened?” (A useful question to ask after a client has a cathartic release).

“And how does that feel?” (Much better than “And how do you feel about that” which pulls the client out of their experience and into a cognitive analysis of their experience.)

•  “And how does feeling stressed feel?”

Summary

It’s one of the things I have to remind myself fairly regularly – It’s not about me, it’s all about the clients – their needs, their fears, their wants, their expectations, their values. Above all, it’s about their worldview, their perception of the situation, not mine!

Writers such as Chris Argyris, Peter Senge and William Torbert all refer to systems thinking and learning and in particular to “single loop, double loop and triple loop” thinking and learning. But what does this mean and in particular, what’s the difference between double and triple loop? I like to be able to find simplicity amongst apparent complexity – it helps me to understand and I can then pass on this understanding to my clients.

For me, the definitions are as follows:

Single loop thinking & learning.

This refers to addressing a situation at the symptoms level. For example, you’re on a ship and it has hit a rock. As a result of the hole this has created, the ship is sinking. Single loop thinking and learning is an entirely appropriate  response – patch the hole and pump out the water… fast! You deal with what you have in front of you, taking it at face value. “It is what it is.”

Double loop thinking & learning.

This refers to addressing the situation at the causal level. In the above example, you’d be seeking to establish what caused the ship to go off course and hit the rocks. You’d look at what people did and at the processes and seek to establish and fix the root cause. In some situations, you could be engaged in reframing what happened, looking at it from a different perspective. Some people talk about double loop thinking and learning as”reframing the content“.

Triple loop thinking and learning.

Triple loop thinking and learning refers to reframing the context about ourselves or the situation. “In what other situations might this happen?” (triple loop thinking), or “In what other situations may we apply what we have learned?” (triple loop learning). Another example of triple loop thinking and learning would be asking “What practices work well in other organisations/sectors of industry that are not currently used in my organisation/sector of industry that if we did apply them, would be innovative and beneficial for us?”

The Triple Loop Trap.

Triple loop thinking & learning presents a potential trap for consultants, leaders and managers. You may have reframed the context for yourself for a particular issue. The trap lies in assuming that those you engage with have done the same! Let me give you a concrete example: I recently attended an Organisational Development workshop where the hosting team had changed their thinking and learning about a particular issue.

In this case it was bringing the spiritual dimension into part of the workshop. It was interesting to witness 3 different reactions from the 70 or so highly experienced consultants who attended the workshop.

One group thought it was the wrong thing to do, that it was all “New Age, touchy feel stuff.”

The second group thought it was inappropriate as they considered spirituality to be a personal, rather than a collective, issue.

The third group were happy with it.

While the second and third group contained people who have spiritual (as opposed to religious) views, they entered the topic through different doorways. The second group started with the individual and, if appropriate, would later expand to the collective. The third group started with the collective and would narrow their focus to the individual when appropriate.

Two Key Issues

There are two issues I want to highlight:

1. If you have reframed the context for yourself/your team, you have to be aware that others will not have changed their thinking and learning. They may be open to the change or they may not. In either case, you need to brief people in advance. The exception to this would be if you wanted people to experience the journey of the change before discussing it. In that case, you have to leave time for people to discus  and reflect on:

a. What just happened?

b. What do I think/feel about what just happened?

c. What are the implications of what just happened?

d. What next ie. do I embrace the change or is it not for me?

2. If the changed context, sometimes rather grandly described as a “paradigm shift” includes a new language, you have to make sure that everyone understands the new vocabulary.

Incidentally, some writers suggest that triple loop learning doesn’t exist in thinking and learning. Their reasoning is simple – both double and triple loops are based on reframing. Their position is deal with it as it is or find a reframe. It’s logical but I prefer to split them into the two different kinds of reframe described above.

Maslow’s Level 5

I mentioned above a recent thinking and learning workshop and introducing the spiritual dimension into the work we do as consultants and coaches. I’ve discussed this with several other consultants and I’ve conclude that one way to do this is in the context of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. I know the model and the way it is taught both have limitations but the reason for using it is that many managers know about it. I’ve started to have conversations with managers about Level 5 being about self-actualisation. In practical terms, this means working with the whole being to help them to unleash s much of their potential as possible.

Authenticity, Effectiveness and Efficiency

For the individual, this helps them to be more authentic.

For their manager, it means the person will be more effective and efficient. Stress and burnout should also be reduced as people won’t have to compromise who they truly are in order to succeed at work.

For the consultant/trainer/coach there is a further dimension – the need for self-awareness so that at any given moment, they are aware of their feelings and thoughts and don’t project them onto the client or the client’s situation. To some extent, our work will always reflect what is going on for us in our own personal journeys. The challenge is to avoid ‘contaminating’ the client’s world view with our own issues!

In the next article I will be looking at a simple model that offers a systematic approach to thinking and learning.

This article looks at an important aspect of how we think – taking responsibility for our lives. This is something that most personal development gurus emphasise, none more so than Steve Pavlina.

Personal Development and Food!

If you repeat something to yourself often enough, you will condition yourself, especially if what you repeat is negative! In many ways, you become what you mentally focus on.

Think about how food builds your body. While you aren’t literally going to become the next meal you consume, the balance of protein, carbohydrates, fat and nutrients will influence what you become.

Your Personal Development, Your Food and Your Past

Whenever you are hungry, you will tend to want the foodstuffs you eat most frequently – it’s a habit. However, you are always free to change what you eat. Similarly, a key personal development truth is that you are not your past.

You are always free to move beyond your programming and change. the first thing is to recognise that many of the choices you make are not really based on free choice. Unless you have worked on it, they will be the result of your programming.

Negative Thought Patterns

This is why negative thinking is so habit-forming and will, if left unckecked, hamper your personal development. If you continue holding negative thoughts, you condition your psyche to expect and even crave those retained inputs. You reinforce and strengthen your programming.

Your neurons will even learn to anticipate the recurrence of damaging stimuli. You’ll practically become a negativity magnet.

This is a hard state of affairs to escape as it’s self-perpetuating, as anybody bound in negative thinking recognizes all too well. Your damaging experiences feed your damaging expectations, which then draw in fresh damaging experiences.

Personal Development Step 1

Therefore, the first step in personal development is to stop fighting. Rather than resisting the negativity head-on, admit and accept its presence. This will really have the effect of elevating your consciousness.

Learn to acknowledge the damaging thoughts consuming your brain – in that way you can surpass them. Allow them to be, but don’t identify with them as those thoughts are not you. Start to interact with them like an observer.

Don’t beat yourself up over this – it’s why you’re here, living out your  life as a human. If you find yourself bogged down in negativity, your personal development task is to develop your consciousness to the point where you are able to learn to stay centered on what you want, to produce positively rather than destructively.

You Don’t Want Personal Development!

You need to get your head around another concept – you are not paying for personal development, you are paying for change! As ananalogy, let’s say you want to hang a picture on a wall – you need holes to put the screws in, so you buy a drill. But you’re not really buying a drill – you’re buying the holes it will make for you!

As a starter, you are looking to move on from questions like: What are you going to make of your life? What if you mess up? What if you try your best and bomb? Those self-doubts are not you – they’re your programming!

You Are Not Your Programs!

The reason you might be stuck in a damaging thought pattern right now is that at some point, you selected it. You envisioned the option of accepting entire responsibility for everything in your reality would be riskier. It’s too much to manage. You’ll remain in a negative manifestation pattern till you’re ready to move beyond your programs..

Negativity needn’t be a lasting condition. You still have the freedom to pick differently. And do you want to know the biggest irony of all? Many of the programs you are running aren’t even yours! You picked them up from your parents, teachers, friends etc. Your negative programs reflect their personal development needs! You’re carrying their burdens!

You see… the true solution to complaining is responsibility. You must say to the cosmos (and mean it), “I want to assume more responsibility for everything in my experience.”

Here are a few examples of admitting responsibility:

• If I’m distressed, it’s because I’m producing the negative stress response..

• If something bothers me, I’m responsible for altering how I think about it.

• If somebody is in need, I’m responsible for helping them.

• If something needs doing, it’s up to me to do it.

• If I don’t enjoy my present conditions, I can change them.

On the other hand, it’s not just about owning the negatives in your life. Take responsibility for the good, too.

It’s one of the personal development needs of a lot of people who suffer from depression – they need to acknowledge and take ownership of the good in their lives – depressed people only see the negative.

Victim Mode

One thing that will completely scupper any personal development initiatives you may decide to embark on, is being in Victim Mode. Constant complaining is one symptom. Blaming others is another- they are merely ways of relieving yourself from being responsible.

When you hear yourself in victim mode, ask yourself if you really want to carry on stopping yourself from accomplishing the personal development task you need in order to become the person you were born to be!

Warrior Mind

Perhaps you’re ready to take on more responsibility, and perhaps you aren’t, but do your best to make that decision consciously. That’s why I started the Warrior Mind site – to help those who are serious about their personal development. If that applies to you, ask yourself the following: do you require sympathy for producing what you don’t want, or do you wish congratulations for producing what you do want? If you are serious about your personal development, the answer will be clear!

One of the bug bears of selling up any kind of commercial website is the need to address so many different  tasks:

You may want to sell:

• eBooks
• Software
• Online Video Courses
• Online Audio
• Access to Membership Sites
• Physical Products
• Drop Ship Products

In which case you need to create:

• Squeeze Pages
• Sales Pages
• Sales Funnels
• Membership Sites
• Affiliate Review Sites
• Information or Content Sites
• Adsense Sites, Amazon Sites etc

And you will need to integrate:

• Autoresponder
• Mailing lists
• Shopping cart
• Affiliate management
• Split testing
• Drip feeding of content

Trying to do all of that with plugins that will play nicely together is a real pain in the butt. I’ve tried many of the plugins for WordPress and Drupal and it’s a mess.

Then I looked at solutions like Infusionsoft (too expensive for my current needs), 1 Shoppingcart (OK but missing important features. A while back I came across FusionHQ and recently, I’ve found that I just keep coming back to it. And it’s not just me, as you can see by watching Gideon Shalwick’s video below. What Gideon doesn’t mention is, for me, one of the key benefits of using FusionHQ – their technical and customer support are the best of breed. They are quick to respond, have a sense of humour and go above and beyond the bare essentials.

Benefits of FusionHQ

You can build:

• Drag and Drop sales funnels
• Drag and drop membership and content sites
• Split testing - I really like FusionHQ’s split testing feature because it’s so simple simple to set up a split test in 20 seconds – all without a single line of code.
• Affiliate tracking and management
• 3rd party integration
• payment gateways - FusionHQ easily integrates with Clickbank, Paypal, 1shoppingcart, 2checkout, Authorize.net and Eway (with more on the way in future upgrades)
• webinar integration - you can set up custom squeeze pages that register people to multiple webinars AND an autoresponder list simultaneously from one form.
• and so much more!

FusionHQ also includes it’s own integrated autoresponder that is included with every account, making it more of a fully integrated system for online business owners.  You can also choose to  continue using your own autoresponder if you so wis as FusionHQ integrates with popular autoresponders such as Aweber, Getresponse, iContact, MailChimp, Imnica mail, InfusionSoft (and more being added).

FusionHQ (affiliate link) is built by internet marketers, in this case Leon Jay, for internet marketers. FusionHQ does away with the need for programmers and designers – you don’t need to know HTML, no PHP, not even FTP – it’s all automated. A lot of it is drag n drop and very intuitive. You can now easily do it yourself or get outsourced staff to do it – it’s really that easy (especially with their FusionBox system which allows you to get a full on business up in 60 seconds – more on that later).

Hosting: each FusionHQ account comes with free cloud hosting to make it super easy to get your websites up and running.

The cool part is that FusionHQ is not one of those platforms that force you to upload your website on THEIR server. Platforms that do this usually take your website should you decide to move on to something else (it doesn’t make good business sense).

So, I’d strongly recommend FusionHQ  (affiliate link) to anyone, for its simplicity and comprehensive suite of benefits.

However, there is one downside to using FusionHQ: it does not contain a blog. I’m therefore in the process of restructuring my sites; http://nic-oliver.com will be my blog, using WordPress. The Coaching Surgery and Warrior Mind will be stores containing links to products related to building a coaching business and to personal development respectively. Those products and services will be placed on FusionHQ sites.

Mindfulness Made Easy – Three Paths to Clarity

Less than six months ago I took a major leap of faith, and landed on the Big Island of Hawaii. These days I live a very minimalist lifestyle.  It’s not for everyone, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.  Each day I volunteer a few hours in the garden, and enjoy a comfortable, private dwelling in return.  I don’t want for anything – that’s not true, I get distracting cravings for brownies every new moon – but I’m far from suffering.

Hawaii truly is a paradise, there’s a sense of peace and serenity that permeates the air. Maybe it’s the languid aroma of tropical flowers in bloom, perhaps it’s the tranquil breezes of the trade winds, whatever it is, it puts most folks in a positive frame of mind.

Ho’oponopono – Making Right More Right

Releasing negativity and inviting positivity is the Hawaiian way of life, which is why Ho’oponopono is so important.  Literally meaning “to make good more good”, the concept boils down to making amends rather than holding onto resentments. When it comes time to release those resentments directed towards the self, facing inner demons is easier with the help of meditation and a calming guide.

I Asked the Universe for a Guide – The Universe Answered

• Falling In Love With Meditation – The very talented Carol Finlayson recently released this little gem.  Being a fan of her work, I snatched it up immediately and devoured it in just a few hours. Finlayson’s straightforward, conversational style makes the topic of meditation approachable and inviting.  I especially like how she integrates stress-relief and radical acceptance into her mindfulness practice.

• Inner Peace –  Falling In Love With Meditation recommends guided meditation as a way to build the daily habit of stilling the  mind and I can think of no better guide than Inner Peace. Nic Oliver’s voice is bliss, and his gentle manner of introducing a meditative state is masterful.  With tranquil music as my traveling partner, I was guided into a deeply relaxed state, and led through a landscape of genuine love and peace. What I like best is this meditation was as potent as it was brief, at less than 20 minutes in length, there’s no excuse to skip an afternoon shot of serenity.

• You Can Meditate – Another offering from Nic Oliver, this book delves deep into the process by which anyone can achieve a meditative state.  Drawing upon scientific evidence, as well as his own lifetime of experience, Nic makes the process of quieting the “monkey mind” simple and relaxing.  I especially liked the way he explained the difference between a normal state of mind, concentration and meditation, it demystified the whole idea of meditation and left me feeling less stressed about doing it correctly.

Meditate for Life

After several years of battling one illness after  the next, I came to Hawaii to heal.  I’ve since found that food is an essential medicine, but true healing integrates a holistic approach of addressing the body, mind, and spirit.  By following a healthy diet I’m able to feel stronger and healthier with each passing day, but it’s the practice of daily meditation that allows me to truly appreciate my little slice of heaven on earth.

If you want to find out more about this package, go to Silence of Being –Meditation for Everyday Living

About the Author:

Freelance writer Rachel Cook takes her health seriously, which is why she loves to grow her own fruits and vegetables. When Rachel isn’t gardening outdoors, she’s hiking along the Hawaiian mountain trails around where she resides.  Equally serious about self-improvement as she is about eating a sensible diet, Rachel visits sites like www.warriormind.com for personal inspiration.

I wasn’t worried about most of my trucker customers because truckers don’t generally care who buses tables as long as the meatloaf platter is good and the pies are homemade. The four-wheeler drivers were the ones who concerned me; the mouthy college kids traveling to school; the yuppie snobs who secretly polish their silverware with their napkins for fear of catching some dreaded “truck stop germ” the pairs of white-shirted business men on expense accounts who think every truck stop waitress wants to be flirted with. I knew those people would be uncomfortable around Stevie so I closely watched him for the first few weeks.

I shouldn’t have worried. After the first week, Stevie had my staff wrapped around his stubby little finger, and within a month my truck regulars had adopted him as their official truck stop mascot. After that, I really didn’t care what the rest of the customers thought of him. He was like a 21-year-old in blue jeans and Nikes, eager to laugh and eager to please, but fierce in his attention to his duties. Every salt and pepper shaker was exactly in its place, not a bread crumb or coffee spill was visible when Stevie got done with the table.

Our only problem was persuading him to wait to clean a table until after the customers were finished. He would hover in the background, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, scanning the dining room until a table was empty. Then he would scurry to the empty table and carefully bus dishes and glasses onto cart and meticulously wipe the table up with a practiced flourish of his rag. If he thought a customer was watching, his brow would pucker with added concentration. He took pride in doing his job exactly right, and you had to love how hard he tried to please each and every person he met.

Over time, we learned that he lived with his mother, a widow who was disabled after repeated surgeries for cancer. They lived on their Social Security benefits in public housing two miles from the truck stop. Their social worker, who stopped to check on him every so often, admitted they had fallen between the cracks. Money was tight, and what I paid him was probably the difference between them being able to live together and Stevie being sent to a group home. That’s why the restaurant was a gloomy place that morning last August, the first morning in three years that Stevie missed work.

He was at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester getting a new valve or something put in his heart. His social worker said that people with Downs Syndrome often have heart problems at an early age so this wasn’t unexpected, and there was a good chance he would come through the surgery in good shape and be back at work in a few months.

A ripple of excitement ran through the staff later that morning when word came that he was out of surgery, in recovery, and doing fine. Frannie, the head waitress, let out a war hoop and did a little dance in the aisle when she heard the good news. Bell Ringer, one of our regular trucker customers, stared at the sight of this 50-year-old grandmother of four doing a victory shimmy beside his table. Frannie blushed, smoothed her apron and shot Belle Ringer a withering look.

He grinned. “OK, Frannie, what was that all about?” he asked.

“We just got word that Stevie is out of surgery and going to be okay.”

“I was wondering where he was. I had a new joke to tell him. What was the surgery about?”

Frannie quickly told Bell Ringer and the other two drivers sitting at his booth about Stevie’s surgery, then sighed: “Yeah, I’m glad he is going to be OK,” she said. “But I don’t know how he and his Mom are going to handle all the bills. From what I hear, they’re barely getting by as it is.” Belle Ringer nodded thoughtfully, and Frannie hurried off to wait on the rest of her tables.

Since I hadn’t had time to round up a busboy to replace Stevie and really didn’t want to replace him, the girls were busing their own tables that day until we decided what to do. After the morning rush, Frannie walked into my office. She had a couple of paper napkins in her hand and a funny look on her face.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I didn’t get that table where Bell Ringer and his friends were sitting cleared off after they left, and Pony Pete and Tony Tipper were sitting there when I got back to clean it off,” she said. “This was folded and tucked under a coffee cup.”

She handed the napkin to me, and three $20 bills fell onto my desk when I opened it. On the outside, in big, bold letters, was printed “Something For Stevie.

Pony Pete asked me what that was all about,” she said, “so I told him about Stevie and his Mom and everything, and Pete looked at Tony and Tony looked at Pete, and they ended up giving me this.” She handed me another paper napkin that had “Something For Stevie” scrawled on its outside. Two $50 bills were tucked within its folds.

Frannie looked at me with wet, shiny eyes, shook her head and said simply: “truckers.”

That was three months ago. Today is Thanksgiving, the first day Stevie is supposed to be back to work. His placement worker said he’s been counting the days until the doctor said he could work, and it didn’t matter at all that it was a holiday. He called 10 times in the past week, making sure we knew he was coming, fearful that we had forgotten him or that his job was in jeopardy.

I arranged to have his mother bring him to work. I then met them in the parking lot and invited them both to celebrate his day back. Stevie was thinner and paler, but couldn’t stop grinning as he pushed through the doors and headed for the back room where his apron and busing cart were waiting.

“Hold up there, Stevie, not so fast,” I said. I took him and his mother by their arms. “Work can wait for a minute. To celebrate you coming back, breakfast for you and your mother is on me!”

I led them toward a large corner booth at the rear of the room. I could feel and hear the rest of the staff following behind as we marched through the dining room. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw booth after booth of grinning truckers empty and join the procession. We stopped in front of the big table. Its surface was covered with coffee cups, saucers and dinner plates, all sitting slightly crooked on dozens of folded paper napkins.

“First thing you have to do, Stevie, is clean up this mess,” I said. I tried to sound stern. Stevie looked at me, and then at his mother, then pulled out one of the napkins. It had “Something for Stevie” printed on the outside. As he picked it up, two $10 bills fell onto the table.

Stevie stared at the money, then at all the napkins peeking from beneath the tableware, each with his name printed or scrawled on it. I turned to his mother.

“There’s more than $10,000 in cash and checks on table, all from truckers and trucking companies that heard about your problems. “Happy Thanksgiving,”

Well, it got real noisy about that time, with everybody hollering and shouting, and there were a few tears, as well. But you know what’s funny? While everybody else was busy shaking hands and hugging each other, Stevie, with a big, big smile on his face, was busy clearing all the cups and dishes from the table. Best worker I ever hired.

Plant a seed and watch it grow. At this point, you can bury this inspirational message or forward it fulfilling the need! If you shed a tear, hug yourself, because you are a compassionate person.

Well.. Don’t just sit there! Share this story!

Keep it going, this is a good one!

A little girl walked to and from school every day. Though the weather that morning was questionable and heavy clouds were forming, she made her daily trek to the elementary school. As the afternoon progressed, the winds goy stronger and stronger, along with thunder and lightning.

The mother of the little girl was concerned that her little girl would be scared as she walked home from school and she herself was worried that the electrical storm might harm her child.

Full of concern, the mother quickly got into her car and drove along the route to her child’s school. As she did so, she saw her little girl walking along, but at each flash of lightning, the girl would stop, look up and smile.

Another and another flash followed quickly and with each, the little girl would look at the streak and smile. When the car was alongside the child, the mother lowered the window and called to her “What are you doing? Why do you keep stopping?” The child answered “I am trying to look pretty. God keeps taking my picture!”

Recently, they decided he was strong enough to receive chemotherapy. However, he also received the first piece of good news for a while: he had been included in a trial by Roche for a drug that has had amazing results during its trial. As a thank you for his participation, Roche have said that if he ends up in the control group, he will still get the drugs once the trial is over! He would never have been able to afford the medication on his own, which costs over £10,000 a month!

Today, we got a fantastic Christmas present. Since his original diagnosis, we have been supplementing his diet with Sodium bi-carbonate and maple syrup (it acts as  a Trojan horse. The cancer cells gorge themselves on the maple syrup and then get zapped with the sodium bicarbonate. Cancer cells don’t like an alkaline environment). He has also been taking a South African herbal preparation that boosts the immune system. Finally, he has been listening to a hypnosis track I recorded for him that focuses on getting him to adopt a mindset of being a cancer survivor and not a cancer sufferer.

It seems that this combination has had an effect because from being a cancer that was spreading to one that is now standing still. A wonderful Christmas present to him and us! He’ll continue to get the immune system boosting combination above so as to strengthen him for the chemo.

Co-incidentally, last evening I watched a repeat of a tv programme about the follow-up to Hurricane Katerina in the USA. It was hugely inspirational to watch the story of a doctor who ran the health centre in Biloxi. Regardless of whether people could afford the treatment, he would treat anyone and everyone. Then the Hurricane devastated the centre. Immediately, he and the key staff got two caravans and created an improvised health centre. The programme was about the Extreme Makeover team, who went to Biloxi and built them a new centre. But the key thing was the work the doctor and his team were doing. Completely selfless devotion.

So spare a few moments to think of those for whom Christmas will be difficult this year – it’s easy to forget them when everyone else is celebrating.

How do you deal with heart pounding stress?  Zen meditation, for example, is one of the good techniques and it actually works. Is there room for the intellectual side of people who can actually smell the roses while on the move? It had me thinking that there really must be something in this ‘mind-over-matter’ thing.

Humor is one of the best medicine there is whenever you are. I mean anyone can pay good money to listen to a comedian just to make you wet your pants after laughing so hard. Despite of what’s been happening, and to those who has gone though the ordeal, it’s better to just laugh while facing the troubles with a clear mind than anger with a clouded vision. One of my favorite celebrities of all time may have to be Woody Allen. Now this is one guy who gives you the in-your-face bluntness that he pulls out with gusto, even without even trying. You can talk just about anything with a man, and he’s bound to mock the subject and you’ll end up laughing rather than being upset about it.

Woody Allen has this to say:

1. “Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.” It sounds good to me, I mean the practicality of all things does involve money but it doesn’t have to take an arm and a leg to get it.

2. “I believe there is something out there watching us. Unfortunately, it’s the government.” ‘Nuff said.

3. “There are worse things in life than death. Have you ever spent an evening with an insurance salesman?” This happens to be one of the classic ones. I mean the issue about life’s little problems isn’t all that bad, until ‘he’ shows up.

Sure, relationships can get complicated, or does have its complications that probably any author about relationships is bound to discover it soon. We follow what our heart desires, unless you’re talking about the heart as in the heart that pump blood throughout your body.

4. “Love is the answer, but while you’re waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty interesting questions.” And if you want more, just keep on asking!

5. “A fast word about oral contraception. I asked a girl to go to bed with me, she said ‘no’.” It sounds, ‘practical’, I think.

And when it comes to everyday life, he really knows how to make the best out of every possible scenario, and it doesn’t involve a lawsuit if he strikes a nerve.

6. “Basically my wife was immature. I’d be at home in the bath and she’d come in and sink my boats.” I never had a boat in my bathtub before. Just staring at it while soaking in hot water makes me seasick already.

7. “I am not afraid of death, I just don’t want to be there when it happens.” If it rains, it pours.

8. “I am thankful for laughter, except when milk comes out of my nose.” It could get worse when you’re guzzling on beerÖ or mouthwash, and it happened to me once!

9. “If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.” At least he doesn’t smite us with lightning, and I’m thankful for that.

And despite of what may happen to all of us in the next ten, twenty, or even thirty years, I guess we all have to see things in a different kind of light and not just perspective. I can’t seem to imagine life without any piece of wisdom that could guide us. Whether we’re religious or not, it takes more courage to accept your fears and learn how to deal with them is all that matters when it comes to even just getting along.

And to sum things up, here is the last nugget of wisdom to go by, whenever, and wherever we may be.

10. “The talent for being happy is appreciating and liking what you have, instead of what you don’t have.”