Sunday Night Success

All right this picture isn’t exactly of my backyard, but it is only a thirty minute drive to get to this location on the side of the Columbia river, so I consider it my backyard. The Columbia, the mountains, the hiking paths, the ski runs, the lakes; I consider all of these to be a part of my “location environment”: the broad area where I live that has a direct affect on how I live.

I need to be IN nature to be truly happy. I didn’t fully realize this until Ashlea and I packed up and moved out of the big city to Rossland, BC. Living in Calgary, nature was always close to us, but we still lived IN the city. It turns out close doesn’t work for me, I need to live in nature, not near it.

Rossland and the surrounding area are the biggest space in my personal geography, but this space defines so much of who I am, how I live, and really provides the overall context for all of the other spaces that make up my personal geography. Shifting my life from the city to the mountains is one of the most important changes I have made and this decision continues to affect all aspects of my personal geography.

This week’s TED video had a big impact on my own creative thinking as I work through my idea of personal geography. Check out the intriguing art of Tom Shannon then continue reading below.

In the video Tom Shannon discusses the unseen fields interacting in the universe and how these invisible forces help him to craft his art. This is how I see the concept of personal geography: all of the different seen and unseen spaces and forces that are helping you to craft your life.

You can simply allow these forces to guide your life or, and for me this is a more empowering view, you can take control of designing the spaces and forces in your life so that your personal geography is not simply a response to circumstances, but is intelligently crafted.

Tom Shannon’s art provides an excellent image of this concept. He uses the natural forces of the universe to create his art, but he also adds his own control over the designs through the creation of his pendulum. He is using the natural spaces and forces to his advantage by designing how they interact with his art.

How can you design the spaces and forces of your personal geography to positively interact with your life?

Read more posts about environmental design and personal geography.

I have had a fabulous start to 2010:

Everything has been going better than “according to plan”.

Funny how that is such a precarious place to be.

Positive results and silly thoughts

With all of these positive results I made a decision a couple of weeks ago that I would put building my private practice on hold and focus on my contract work. At the time it made perfect sense: the contract work is paying my bills and a little bit more, it is most important, full steam ahead.

Which was followed by an even sillier thought: I can start building my private practice again if the contract work slows down or comes to an end.

All the cogs in the machine

Most of you have already seen the complete gap in my thinking process, funny how it took me a few weeks, and some prodding from my SNS group and my own coach, to catch on.

Why stop helping people just because things are going well?

Why wait for something to go wrong before building up another income stream for my business and my family?

The contract work is great, but it is only a piece of the overall vision for success. I am having a lot of fun with the work and learning a lot. The opportunities just keep opening up and it is fabulous. However, that does not mean I don’t need the other piece of the vision, my private practice, spinning inside the machine.

If I am having great success with one aspect of the plan, why not work on having even more success by continuing to work on all the parts?

Gratitude for my support network

The thanks for this realization goes to those relationships that provide me with the support that has helped me with my recent success. Without their questions and gentle (and sometimes not so gentle) prodding I would be moving forward but leaving some important pieces behind.

Now it is time to refocus and get back on track.

What is one area of your own life that you may be feeling too comfortable with? How would things look different if you shook things up and put some energy back into this area?

“If cleaning out your closet everyday helps you achieve your dreams then why not clean out your closet everyday?”

The small things matter

This idea has popped up twice in the last two weeks during my coaching sessions: clients brushing off the silly little things they do as if these things have no effect on why they are having success.

“I always run if I write my runs out on a calendar and make sure I have my iPod with me. Silly things like that.”

And,

“I cleaned out my closet and got this burst of energy. If only I could clean out my closet before every challenging task I have to do.”

If scheduling and listening to music help you run then are they silly little things?
If it works then why not clean out your closet every time you have a challenging task?

Pay attention to what works then do it over and over again

It seems like people like to focus on the big things that help them to succeed: training and education, business systems, mastermind groups, coaches, meetings, etc.; while ignoring the little things that could be just as important.

I start everyday of working from home with two cups of coffee. Cup of coffee number one signals: time to hang out with my son and enjoy the morning. Then I get ready for work and grab cup of coffee number two which signals: time to go to the office and get the day started.

Two cups of coffee. Every morning. In the exact same pattern.

Silly? Perhaps. Does it work for me? Definitely.

What parts of your day do you currently consider silly or unimportant that could actually be one of the small keys to your success?

“Geography is destiny in medicine” Jack Lord, MD
Have you ever thought about how where you live can have an effect on your health?

I was watching a TED presentation by Bill Davenhall today, the topic: “Your health depends on where you live”. It is just under ten minutes long and well worth watching:

By design if I wanted to have a heart attack I lived in the perfect places

This is the conclusion that Bill comes to part way through the video after mapping out his geographical location over the course of his life. Watching this video started up the gears in my brain (special thanks to Andrea Lee and Thomas Leonard as well), as TED talks generally do, and got me to thinking:

If physical geography has such a huge impact on my health, how does my overall personal geography affect my life and my success?

Forming an idea: Personal geography

I love to talk about environmental design and how it affects the success that we have in our lives. So, what if I took Bill Davenhall’s idea of environment affecting health and applied it to a review of my own personal geography. Instead of limiting the question to how does this personal geography affect my health, expand the question to how does personal geography affect all aspects of my life.

What does the physical space of my home look like? My office? My car?
How much time am I spending in the natural world?
Am I taking care of my body?
What important relationships do I have?
How does my job/business affect me?
What am I reading? Watching? Listening to?

How are each of these different environments, which build up my personal geography, affecting my success?
How is my personal geography helping me to live the life I dream about?
How is my personal geography holding me back? Pulling me forward?

Mind moving fast

Admittedly, this is not the most cohesive blog post in the history of blog posts, but that is all right. I am excited. My mind is activated. I am just trying to get the ideas out and on “paper” so I can start to work on them.
And I could use everyone’s help. As I start to develop this idea of personal geography I would love feedback and comments from all of you. Let’s start with:

What is your first impression of the idea of having a personal geography (personal life geography?)?

Ten of twenty-one:
1. Investigate mailchimp – Complete.
2. Work with Dad on Blog theme – Complete.
3. Plan out SNS changes – Complete.
4. Make pencast of SNS changes – Incomplete.
5. Change coach website to subdirectory – Complete.
6. Point URL to new “under construction” coaching site – Complete.
7. Download Ecto trial – Complete.
8. Download Fastpencil documents into Writeroom – Complete.
9. Pack business necessities for Calgary trip – Complete.
10. Write 30 minutes 7 times for NaNoWriMo – Complete.
11. Write “Homepage” – Incomplete.
12. Write “Is this you” page – Incomplete.
13. Write “How it works” page – Incomplete.
14. Write “Last Ditch” page – Incomplete.
15. Write “About” page – Incomplete.
16. Write “Sign up” page – Incomplete.
17. Write “Contact” page – Incomplete.
18. Write “Archives” page – Incomplete.
19. Write Coaching Model – Complete.
20. Write Power Tool – Incomplete.
21. Reorganize goals for end of year – Incomplete.

Lacking the list

This week didn’t go so well. For the first time in a long time, a really long time, I didn’t make half of my list. The reason? I think, upon relfection, there are a few, but the biggest one by far was I ended up without internet for the middle of the week. Not only did I not have internet, but I did not activate my Google Gears properly so was without my list for all of those days.

Without my list, which I normally check on a daily basis, I ended up a bit lost with what I was doing. In fact, it was not until today when I had a chance to look at my list again, that I even remembered a couple of the items I had on my list. By not being able to do my daily check I fell out of my normal process and things came to a bit of a grinding halt.

Action list as an environment

This is an excellent example of how effort is just not enough for achieving success. My effort alone allowed me to get ten items completed on my weekly list, but after that, I lost focus. When I have my action list at hand, and I start to lose focus, I don’t need to spend any time or energy trying to figure out what to do next. I open my list and I am instantly back on track. My weekly action list supports me in being successful by keeping my mind clear and focused.

Has my list become too important to my success or is it still the supportive environment I think it is? I would love to hear what you think.

I have been working a lot lately on building supportive environments in my life, with an extra focus on improving my physical environment: the objects and places in my life that are either promoting or blocking my success.

SNS on the road

My wife, son, and I are on a road trip as I write this. This road trip to visit friends and family will take me away from the internet for a few days. This has given me an opportunity to review some of the important environments that I will need to have success while on the road.

Coaching on the road

While driving to Fernie, BC I needed to participate in my supervised coaching class which is a requirement for my upcoming graduation. To do this we stopped in a small town with cell coverage and my wife and son went for dinner while I sat in the car and took my class.

Upon reflection I realized I had interacted with a number of my physical environments, some that supported me and some that need improvement:

Supportive environments

1. Honda Element: my wife and I own a great car that is in great shape. By owning this car I had the confidence to take this important class while on our trip because I trusted that my car would get us safely, and on time, to a town with cell coverage.
2. Cell phone: my cell phone gave me clear reception so that I could hear my class, and hear my client during the class. My client was also able to hear me clearly.
3. iPod Touch: I had my phone numbers, PIN numbers, and call details stored in my iPod Touch which allowed me to be organized for the phone call.
4. Ashlea: my wife was an important relationship environment as she supported me in stopping our trip for 90 minutes and keeping our son busy while I was on the call.
5. Scott: my client, Scott, agreed to be coached during my supervised coaching sessions. Without his support I would not have been able to complete the class.

Environments that need improvement

1. Headset: as clear as my phone made the call the cheap headset I use with my phone is not very comfortable and needs adjusting constantly. I do all of my coaching on the phone so a better, more comfortable, headset will definitely improve my coaching success.
2. Cell phone plan: I am making more long calls with my business cell now that my coaching business is picking up. I have a feeling this call, and the other calls I need to make while on this roadtrip are going to put me over my current minutes. I could also probably use a better long distance plan. Improving my cell plan will save me money and give me peace of mind: adding support to my success as a coach.

Focus on your environments, then design them

Thinking of your physical world as one big support environment, and then breaking it down into all of the little environments is a perspective that most people never consider.

However, for me it has changed my whole outlook for the better. I am spending less time and energy on being successful, because now my environments are working towards my master plan.

I would like to challenge you to start looking at your physical and relationship worlds as a bunch of small support environments. Then, pick one of these environments and ask yourself:

How could this environment be more supportive of my success?

There is a book inside of me.

In fact, I have always had the feeling that there are quite a few books inside me. The problem is, somewhere between my high school writing enthusiasm, and joining the “real” adult world I lost trust in my writing skills.

I found that trust again while working for “The Electric Playground” as a freelance, and then staff writer, and entered a period of writing productivity that resulted in many published articles and one published short story. Unfortunately, the real world struck again, I got busy “making a living” and lost my way as a writer once again.

The coaching mindset

A lot has changed for me in 2009, most of it centered around my training as a professional coach. I have been learning about creating and living my dreams, and developing strategies to create supportive environments that are helping me to be successful.

As a coach I know that I can do anything as long as I set my mind to it, make sure it is actionable, and find the resources and supports that I need to be successful. This shift towards achieving my dreams has been life altering, and my perspective on my world is now constantly improving.

The writing mindset

My new coaching mindset has resulted in a return to the idea of not only writing, but being a writer. To succeed in this move back into a writing lifestyle I have filled my life with various support environments:

1. Macbook: I write on the computer and my old PC laptop was cumbersome, hot, and difficult to work on. My Macbook was a big investment, but it was an investment in an environment that has made writing enjoyable again. Totally worth it.
2. Blogging: Sunday Night Success has been the most important writing environment I have created. Setting a post schedule and sticking to that schedule (with a hiccup here and there) has quickly put me back into the writing mindset.
3. Reading: to help me return to my writing ways I have started reading books on the creative process and writing. Reading this material helps support me in developing the writing habits that are crucial to my success as a writer.

4. NaNoWriMo

I have done an excellent job of supporting myself in writing nonfiction, but I still wasn’t moving forward with getting all of those books out of my head. Then I stumbled upon NaNoWriMo.

National Novel Writing Month presents a challenge to all hopeful novelists who are stuck with getting started: write 50,000 words in the month of November. Write an entire novel, or at least get a healthy start, in one month. Just let it all out.

Accepting the challenge and being accountable

I have accepted the NaNoWriMo challenge and started writing my 50,000 words on November 1st. I am already behind schedule (1667 words a day) by a few thousands words, but I plan on catching up.

NaNoWriMo has now become a new support environment in my life that will hopefully help pull me towards my long time goal of writing one or more novels. However, I don’t think the NaNoWriMo challenge is enough, so I will be using Sunday Night Success to help me stay accountable to this challenge. Keep an eye on the top right of the sidebar for my updates on words written. Hopefully you will watch it approach and then break the 50,000 word mark by November 30th.

Are you ready to move out of your comfort zone and into you danger zone?

What goal or challenge have you been avoiding because you don’t have the right support environments in place?

What is one environment you could make today that would help support you in being successful?

I have decided this week to stop drinking coffee. Well, to be completely honest, I still get one cup of coffee in the morning, but that is it (I am very tempted to go out and purchase a VERY large cup).

Why am I giving up coffee?

Coffee has not been supporting my success lately. I have needed to drink more and more coffee each day to get any sort of useful buzz, and this past week I have started having some stomach issues. The buzz I do get only lasts until about noon and then I go into crash mode and it is time to have a nap and recover. Long term, coffee and me, we aren’t going to work out.

So, out with the coffee.

Success without caffeine?

The problem is, I am almost useless at the moment. I am walking around in permanent zombie mode without the desire to start snacking on brains (yet). My focus is off, my ability to concentrate and work has gone out the window, and when I look at my action list I immediately start scanning for the easiest things to get done: I am avoiding the challenges.

But, is this really a problem?

Sometimes things have to get worse before they get better

In the long run this change is going to be good for me. I have stopped drinking coffee before and I know that, after a couple of weeks, I will be back on track and moving forward. For the most part I am more functional off coffee than I am on coffee, so I know long term this change in my environment will support me.

Changing one of your habits, picking up a new habit, or altering one of your environments can have a serious effect on how you function on a day-to-day basis. Making these changes can, at first, seem to be the exact opposite of what you need to do as your success suffers. What you need to remember is that although it may be tough at first, your goal is to create a new habit or environment that is going to support you more and help you be even more successful.

Sometimes we have to look further ahead in time for the results we are going to achieve and prepare ourselves for the slump before success.

Is there a habit or environment you need to change in your life? Have you avoided making the change because you know things will get harder before they get better?