I am still in the process of figuring out how I want to create the conversation around the personal geography newsletter. So, for issue number one, and maybe more after that if this seems to work, I have created this post to share your ideas about what you read in the newsletter.
Please, share your thoughts on the first newsletter below so we can get the conversation started.
If you have no idea what this post is talking about, but would like to know more sign up for the Sunday Night Success Personal Geography newsletter here:
Hey Jeremie:
So I am curious about Items #2 and #3:
2. The key to success is designing the spaces
within and around you to support you, provide
energy, and do most of the work.
3. Designing spaces that push your limits will
help you become the person you didn’t even know
you wanted to be.
When you talk about designing the “spaces”, to what are you referring?? My mental state, the clutter on my desk, systems for invoicing?
And of course, the question of what you mean with #3 will likely get clearer when I understand #2.
I ask, because I am in the midst of a complete inner redesign, a reframing of my inner self, and it’s affecting my work, my job (which is separate from my work), and my life. I am finding that as my inner landscape changes, that I have very little mooring in the world, and I feel adrift. Unable to make a move, because I don’t know whether it’s coming from a stable place…It’s a very odd place to be coming from, as I’m usually a take-charge kind of gal.
I love the idea of personal geography, it ties into my own experience of myself through shamanic work and meditation. The question is, am I mapping this territory, or am I designing it?
If we’re all designing our personal geography, then HOW does that happen, exactly? Goals, lists, meditation? I am vitally interested in your thoughts about this.
Thanks for the chance to think about something in a new way.
Annah
“When you talk about designing the “spaces”, to what are you referring?? My mental state, the clutter on my desk, systems for invoicing?”
I am talking about all of these Annah and more. The challenge with personal geography is to shift your perspective so you see everything as a space/environment that you can influence and that influences you.
How does the clutter on your desk affect your ideas, projects, moods, etc? How can you change that space to create a feeling of happiness? A feeling of commitment? Or any other feeling you are having.
How can you change your invoicing space so that it functions with less effort and uses less energy?
What spaces are affecting your mental state? Instead of just trying to change your mental state on your own, how can you craft the spaces around you to change your mental state? Change a colour, buy flowers, go for a walk, listen to music, spend time with a certain person, etc.
The idea is to change what is around you so that it has the desired affect on you, instead of just letting the spaces around you create a random result.
“The question is, am I mapping this territory, or am I designing it?”
This is a great question and I think I need to add a point to my list. I think first we have to map it (which I have many ideas on how to do) then we begin to design it. To continue with the geography analogy first you have to place the “you are here X” then you have to start changing the map so that “you are where you want to be” or even better “you are somewhere fabulous you hadn’t even thought about”
I hope that helps, I know your questions and comments have helped me.
Thank you so much!
Jeremie
Ha! Yep, I know for a fact that when I clean the physical clutter that it’s often a metaphor for cleaning house mentally, too.
I like the “you are here” metaphor. I think that I have not had that feeling recently – as if I was discovering my inner landscape without seeing the ‘me’ in it; if you get what I mean.
I really appreciate the concepts here – they’ve been working on me all day, and I think will continue to reverberate as I digest the ideas. And I will put myself into my inner geography – maybe even try and see myself there from a third-person perspective for a change.
It’s a fun dialogue, Jeremie! thanks.
Annah
Annah,
Not see yourself on your own map is an interesting idea I hadn’t considered. I think finding your spot on the map would probably be part of the mapping your current personal geography step. As you review and scan all of your different spaces your place on that map will start to flicker into existence.
Once you have a better understanding of your personal geography and find your “you are here X” then you will have a clearer picture of what you need to do.
Jeremie