4 simple steps that can change your day around

I find I am a morning person. It is 11:00 pm right now and writing a blog is proven to be much harder than doing it first thing in the morning. I would have thought that it would be easy because of all the experience through the day, but finding something interesting to write about is not as easy. It feels like I cant relax the mind to concentrate solely on the writing, instead my mind is racing with ideas and judgments. My morning habits I feel are on point, but my night habits I still need to work on. Today everything got thrown off with 2 of my pets being sick at 3:00 am. It definitely affected my whole day. Not being in control made me angry and miserable. What could I have done differently?

1. Realized that I am not in control of the external surroundings

2. Taken into consideration that I was making myself miserable (no one else can)

3. Handled the matter with a positive attitude

4. Smiled

Those 4 simple steps would have impacted how the rest of my day went.

To be continued....
   

What makes you, you?

Our minds and our body go through constant changes. How do we recognize these changes? Only way is by being mindful of those changes. Am I talking about sitting and meditating for an hour a day, no not at all, just be self aware. Besides the obvious of learning and applying the learning we also change in our appearance, our preference, our goals, habits etc. How do we apply those changes to ourselves? As far as the habits and goals we can everything else is done for us by constantly adapting. The only thing we can do is realize and observe that the changes have taken place. To refer to myself, the transformation I have gone through is amazing in the last year. Before this last year I have never finished a book, the furthest I have gone is to the third chapter, now I read 3 books a week, 2 audio books and 1 hard copy.

Your probably wondering how I manage to have all this free time to read this much, I don't, and I will share with you in my future blogs the strategy I apply. I talked more then I listened. I made up my mind before considering the possible outcomes. I had a fixed mindset. One year ago I lacked the ability to see beyond the obvious, and I was selfish and narrow minded. I am proud of how I became the person I am today. This is due to all the books and blogs I read, I listen more and I am constantly in tune with myself and my surroundings. Did these changes occur over night, definitely not. Am I continually changing, of course, and so are you. I encourage you to recognize who and what shapes you to become who you are. To paraphrase Jim Rohn "you are the average of the 5 closest people you spend your time with". This is completely true, and I noticed myself the more I spend time with people the more of their traits I possess. So choose those friends wisely!

To be continued....

How do things for free lose their value?

I take free things for granted. Do you? I feel like when something is free you don't value it as much as opposed to something that you have to pay for, and I am talking about material things not adventures. I have apple T.V. where I pay to watch movies and shows. I cut back on watching T.V. simply because I feel it brings no value to my life. However when I am with my girlfriend or a friend we put a movie on. I used to watch every preview possible. Choosing a movie was quiet the process simply because paying for a movie felt like I did not want to waste the money and pick a bad one. When I was by myself I sometimes used to sit for a duration of a whole movie and just watch previews because they are free and because it was hard to decide on which movie to spend money on. Now having the android box my girlfriend and I rent any movie and usually it takes less then 2 minutes to decide. When we do watch the movie we tend to lose interest in it faster then movies we payed for. Is it because we don't give a f*** about it? Does money make things seem more valuable? It seems to be this way. You can try for yourself, put something outside you want to give away, give it a price tag, and watch how fast someone will come take it as opposed to putting a sign on it saying FREE. Free things seems to be harder to give away. I had a piano and couch's I was giving away and it took a lot more work. You would think people would be eager to come grab a set of 2 year old sectional leather couch's and a functioning piano. Wrong!  It took convincing and constant reminding. Next time I will want to give something away Ill just put a price tag on it will see how fast I can get rid of whatever it is I am giving away. Using the scarcity principle always works in every aspect. We always want what we cant have and we always want what there is a shortage of. I feel there is a misconception with free things. How can we see the value in free things? I suppose looking at the functionality of it, seeing how much it would be worth to someone who is in need is always a good way to measure its value. I know my parents or my girlfriends and many other people see value in free things. I have a hard time finding the value, I criticize it more and the meaning of it is squandered. Do you see value in free material possessions?

To be continued....

What you should know about communication

Is it hard for men to express emotions? for myself I feel that I have trouble speaking my true feelings to some people who are very important in my life, however it is much easier to the people who I feel will not pass judgement but instead encouragement and support.

We had a debate in my IDEA class about communication and overall majority expressed that men reveal there emotions more often then women do. I think that it doesn't matter about the gender for communicating, it depends on who you communicate with, and how strong your connection to the person you communicate with. Knowing what to say is not as important as to how you say it. This has been the trouble for me, and I have been told this numerous times that I sound 'sarcastic'. I guess I understand why that is, because most of our communication is non verbal. What I learned yesterday is that not only is our communication non verbal but it is also done through a bio-energetic field. We run on frequency's and if our frequency's are aligned we are capable of being in sync with one another. As my best friend put it "mind melding". 

Do you ever feel that sometimes when you think about someone all of the sudden you get a call from them or they communicate to you somehow. This happens to me more often then not, noticing it and not dismissing it as a pure coincidence is becoming in tune with yourself. 

To be continued....

How giving back requires bold effort

The giving dilemma. Who knew it was going to be this hard to give in a more meaningful way. I have gone out with my friends and handed out lunches to the homeless here in Vancouver BC. However as I wrote in one my recent posts that me and a friend have created a Givers Group. In this group we want to not only give but to make a lasting impact and create a pay it forward, were our giving is not only helping those directly but also indirectly, the people who are given will give back to the people they know. We want to change the lives of the people who are open minded to see that they have more potential then they actually think they do. Well it turns out that its not as simple as it sounds. We went to the covenant house yesterday and we pitched our idea to the coordinator, only to be told that what we are doing is good but not good enough. That we have the right intentions, but that it is not something that they are interested in. Of course this brings us to square one, or does it? Gaining a tone of knowledge and a different perspective just through listening and understanding how these organization are run and what it takes to become volunteers. Through frustration of wanting to give but not being able to in the manner of which we proposed means that we have to shift our focus and strategy to an organization that will be more receptive to our way of wanting to give. After that meeting we went to attend a seminar hosted by one of our friends who is the founder of the H.E.A.T movement, and we came to the realization that giving prevention is less of an uphill battle then giving the cure, this was said by someone who has been working on delivering the cure for 18 years and has found it extremely difficult. It is like someone being in the water and you are outside trying to save them with a rope but instead of you saving them and pulling them out of the water they are pulling you in. We where focused on presenting a possible cure to those already in need, what if we switched our focused instead on the prevention, how many lives could we impact then? Who would be more open minded to our giving ways. Well we have to start somewhere, and we will began at pulling our resources and our givers to attend various events in the lower mainland and city of Vancouver in volunteer positions to help and build on ideas that are already happening now (innovate). This helps us establish a portfolio and our credibility within our community. We don't want to duplicate anything that is happening already because that wouldn't be contributing instead it would be wasting potential resources. Then we will implement our strategy of giving.

To be continued....

My five morning rituals which shape the person I am becoming

What is your morning ritual? We are creatures of habit and we all have rituals/habits. When you wake up in the morning and go to bed at night what do you do to better yourself? Do you sit there and watch t.v. (the news) and go to bed with negativity? Do you wake up in the morning and read the newspaper and drink your coffee to give you the morning boost? Many of us are unaware of these subtle habits that we do each and everyday because they are so automated. Habits are formed by actions, feelings and rewards (read The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg). My habits I am aware of because I created them through consciousness. When I wake up in the morning what gets me going is knowing that I get to learn something new each and everyday. The first thing I do is yes open my eyes, and go over to greet my pets, they give me a sense of value and belonging. After the brief introduction I began reading, I read non fiction books every morning when I wake up and every night before I go to bed. Reading is a form of meditating for me. It lets me get into the readers mind, and the facts and the lessons I take from the non-fiction books helps me in my everyday life. After about 30 minuets of reading I go on my computer and check my emails briefly, then if there is an interesting blog I would read that as well. The next habit I developed recently, (its true it takes time to develop habits, if you have a reward after your action then the habit tends to from quicker then the 21 day period that experts declare), blogging daily to reflect and get a deeper insight of myself. After I have posted the blog, I will jump into a cold shower, feels invigorating and gives me the boost that coffee gives most people ( I am not a coffee drinker), following that by walking my pets, feeding them, and getting the day started with work. The rewards I feel after my habits are:
Pets- Feeling valued, grateful
Reading- Feeling smarter, relaxed
Emails/Blog- Feeling a sense of accomplishment
Cold Shower- Feeling a boost and instant wake up
Walking/Feeding pets- something that I feel is necessary and cannot be altered
So I ask you the reader, to be self aware of your daily habits because they shape you to become who you are and who you will be.

To be continued....

The time I learned a valuable lesson

Do you feel that you are more busy then you want to be? This is how I felt before I lost my driving license. As obvious as this sounds we create our own busyness by ourselves. The day I lost my license for a 23 day period, I called my best friend the morning off and actually wept I was so upset, yet the next day I felt like the weight of the world was lifted of my shoulders. Yes at first loosing it I was distraught because I felt like I was incompetent of scheduling any appointments and I felt like my work was going to suffer. Being a multi-preneur having a licence is crucial, or so I thought. Turns out that creativity kicks in times when it is most needed. Delegation of tasks became a priority, what seemed like such a busy time managing 4 businesses simultaneously actually became fun and exciting. It seemed like time was on my side and not against me. Before loosing my license time seemed to get away from me, and all I was doing is playing catch up, I am sure most of you reading this can relate. Loosing my license gave me an insight I never had before, how precious time is, how we can accomplish so much by taking into account what we do every minute of the day, and that we create our own busyness. There was times when I lost my license and thought to myself how I was so busy in the time I had a license. I should mention that I lived in a rural area where there is public transit near by, and the nearest bus would have taken me 2 hours at the minimum to get to where it used to take me 20 minutes by car. I know how I was so busy, it was because I decided to take on every task and challenge as all entrepreneurs think they can accomplish everything and that they are the best at everything they do. Well I guess I always seem to learn the hard way, and that is by loosing something first to realize the lesson. The lesson learned is that being busy is a choice. You have the power to choose and your not obligated to. Your time is important! and it is irreplaceable

To be continued...

What inspires you to do what you love?

I have been working on a philanthropic project with one of my friends/partner. We call it the Givers Group. It has been a journey of '1000' steps to get to where we are today. I guess with any journey it seems to be this way. Me and my partner met through one of his meetup networking groups called MIT (Millionaire In Training). Sharing our passions we quickly realized that we both wanted to give and had many ideas as to how we would want to give, we had a common purpose. With our unique ability as entrepreneurs we decided to organize a group, later to be called the GG or formally as the Givers Group. The idea behind this was to bring one friend each and to share our ideas with them to get a different perspective and other ideas as to how we can evolve our original idea of giving back to our community in our own backyards. There are many places in the world, in fact over half the population lives in poverty (Gumball Population), depending if you define poverty as people living below the standard of living. However we decided to tackle the problems that are in our community in which we live in first in hopes of growing this organically on a grass root level. After seeing that we would basically be repeating our selves by bringing only one friend and after asking that one friend to bring another friend who shares the same common passion to help those in need, we then decided to invite all of those who we know who would want to participate in something like this. I mean who wouldn't want to give back out of the goodness of their heart. Well turns out it isn't as easy as we thought to organize a group of like minded individuals and couples (mastermind group) who would be so kind as to give back to those who are struggling and have less then they do. Our first brainstorming group was about 13 people strong, the one to follow was about 10 people all of which where not the same as the first group. I mean you would think that all the people from the first group would come back. We were not asking for handouts but instead we wanted to gather the best ideas and recruit members to join the organization to help within our community. Turns out that their time was worth more then to be giving the treasure (knowledge) they possess. A leader takes a leap and a risk to pursuing something he/she is passionate about, builds a tribe and has people follow by being inspired. Well it wasn't as easy as we thought to inspire others to join along. However actions speak louder then words, and we are organizing and event with the Covenant House, a shelter for teenagers who are displaced in Vancouver, we will be doing something that is fun and educational to get our message across that we want to not only make a difference but we also want to make a profound change and lasting impact to all those we encounter, not just the people we give to but also the people we give with. I will be documenting our journey through my blogs so stay tuned for more. I hope I can inspire you the reader to do something similar. It is easy to do something you love it is hard taking that first leap and the risk to dedicating your time to pursing what you love to do.

To be continued....

Are you using the right social media platform?

My goal is to start writing a daily blog of reflection , idea sharing and discovery habit. I adopted this principle from one of the blogs that I follow Prsuit. The reason for this is not only will it help me in my journey of self discovery, also it will give the readers a better sense of who I am and what I do, and it will build a platform for myself. With practice comes mastery.

I have been running a social media campaign on one of my companies Aladdin Homecare for about 3 weeks. Yesterday I realized the power of my personal social media support and how I can implement that into my company. Inviting people to like my page on Facebook has brought my likes up enormously over one day I received more likes then the past 2 months. What I find interesting about this is how today's businesses not only survive but depend and thrive on social media and SEO (search engine optimization). If you don't have social media chances of your business success are slim, It was not like this about fifteen years ago. People had to work hard and spend alot of time and money in advertising. Today you can hire someone for less then half the price to manage your website and social media, as long as there doing the right work and targeting the right audience success is inevitable. Think about it, how do you choose which restaurant to go to or find the best handyman. Before it was opening the yellow pages, picking up the house phone, asking many questions and believing the person on the other line. Today it is about the reviews and likes you see on social media and Google, we trust other consumers experience over the business personal. To gain awareness you must be heavily involved with Facebook (1 billion user) platform, and any other social media platform based on the business goals and industry. Instagram (28 million users) is a great platform for image friendly businesses like restaurants, retail, technology, design etc. Linkeden is basically a professional CV online. It is amazing how we are evolving and the paper and pen are becoming so obsolete. Soon we will be in a virtual world where we don't leave our own houses to do any type of work, or enjoy any type of setting or outing.

To be continued....

Social Belief

I quit drinking. Alcohol is a socially acceptable behavior by everyone globally. Why is that? Why have we as a society consider it the norm to drink to be socially accepted? Am I an outcast for not following the crowd, for enjoying myself by being sober? I ask these questions because I find it fascinating that when I attend any event or a social gathering among'st friends I am considered a "loser" for not having any drinks and ordering a hot water with a lemon and honey. Yet when I tell people in general, not at any social gathering or party, that I quit drinking, I get praised and acknowledged that what I am doing is noble and wise for having the 'will power' to not drink in social gatherings. The reason I put will power in apostrophe is because I do not believe in will power. I believe in habits. We have the power to instill habits that are constructive or destructive. I was able to reconfigure my habits so they would serve me and not the other way around. Did I do it for myself or did I do it for recognition? That's an easy question to answer. I certainly did not do it for the fame. I highly recommend to read The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg. I had read this book prior to quieting and what interested me was the fact that we are most times not even aware of our habits, we just do it because after every action > a reward happens. Becoming self-aware of your actions and why you do them your able to manipulate them with different actions and attain similar rewards. The worst is when I get pressured and constantly harassed by close friends to drink. I swear the drunker they get the more they resent my not drinking.

To be continued....

Transition

What a crazy week it has been for me. I have decided to finally move to the city. This has been a long time interest of mine. Right now I live in the suburbs, nice quite neighborhood. I walk outside my front door and I am surrounded by wilderness, it is so refreshing to hear the birds chirping, the whistling of the trees, the sound of water running through the creek. I live in an elevated area and I have a breathtaking view of the mountains and the city lights below. There are a few reasons for this move. The most important of all is moving back in with the woman I fell in love with over 8 years ago. She has stood by me through good times and bad times. I appreciate her courage, loyalty, honesty, integrity and I can go on and on about the type of woman she is, she makes me feel like I belong. It is very rare to come by someone like this, and when you do I suggest to hang on to this person and never let go. What will be interesting is adapting to the space of which we will be living in, the atmosphere and the active life of the busy city. It will be a different kind of wilderness, walking out my elevator, and greeting the concierge on the way out the front doors, humans dashing up and down the sidewalks to get to where they need to go, the cars, the fumes, the buses and the sky rises. I look forward to this move, a ton of opportunity is waiting for me for when I arrive. Next time you will be reading this I will have moved into my 22nd floor with amazing views of the ocean and city sky view, with my amazing woman and my wonderful pets. I leave you with one last note, appreciate all what you have and look for opportunities where there are non, because the more open you are the more chance you will create them. There are so many great articles that I read that inspire me to think the way I do, and these are a must read for you too, Prsuit and hdf magazine.

To be continued....