What’s been going on?!

The past couple of months have been busy but frustrating for me and this has been characterized by the problems I have had getting this blog post written. I’ve tried starting several times, but have found it difficult to get into the right frame of mind, or I have started and then needed to do one of the many household things a mum has to do.

But are these just excuses?

They probably are. I just haven’t had the umph in me to really get going. It’s there in the mind, but not in practice.

It probably hasn’t helped that I have been ill. At the beginning of November I suffered a recurrence of the post-viral fatigue that kept me off work for an extended period three years ago. Although this time my symptoms are not quite as severe, it has still been enough to mean that I have not been at work for a month and the doctor has signed me off work until the start of the new term.

One of the main problems I have found has been the ability to concentrate for any period of time as it often leaves me feeling extremely light headed. The doctors have said that the best way to recover is through rest.

This has left me thinking about how I can move forward in small blocks of time.

For several years I have subscribed to Flylady. It began as a site to help get your home decluttered, but has grown to be much more than that.

One of Flylady’s sayings is “You can do anything for 15 minutes – except whine!”. I have that posted up on the wall over the computer, so I see it regularly. Although I have taken some of the ideas on board and tried to do the things that she suggests, I have not been particularly disciplined with it. Perhaps that is why I am still living with lots of clutter around me!

That is also true for working online.

Time and time again I have read that you must have goals, be disciplined, put in regular effort etc etc. My head knows that, but I so often find excuses and don’t carry through with what I had intended to do. Yet once we actually start those jobs which we think will take us a really long time, they take a lot less time than we expected.

So why do we do this to ourselves?

For my own part I know that I am not as disciplined as I should be with my time management. I use the excuse that as a mum I have so many other calls on my time and energy which often change at the last minute. I don’t have the luxury of being able to put everything else on one side whilst I concentrate on writing a blog post or article, working on our online business etc.

For example as I write this I have washing in the washing machine, Christmas letters and cards to write (it’s the last posting date to USA, Australia and New Zealand today and I haven’t written any cards, letters etc!) as well as the 101 other things I have to do to keep the household running smoothly. Yet I know that I have used this as an excuse and even a small change in the ACTION I take on a regular basis will make a huge difference.

It is a year since I began my coaching with Alex Jeffreys who is giving away free places on his next coaching course. One of the first things that he taught us was to make our plans and to be disciplined in keeping to them. I’ve done this in my head, but have I done it in practice? Not really and that is where I have come unstuck.

A couple of nights ago I clicked on the links in my blogroll to the other blogs set up by Alex’s students a year ago. I was saddened, but not really surprised to find many of those blogs where the domain had lapsed. For several others the last post on the blog had been at the beginning of 2009.

I was more heartened to see those where they were not posting on the original subject of the blog – i.e. the list building that we were learning with Alex Jeffreys and that particular type of internet marketing – but they had found a new route to take and were using the blog for their new line of business.

One or two blogs were still providing the useful and entertaining content that I have become accustomed to over the past 12 months.

It is not my role to speculate about why this has happened – it is merely an observation; but as for me, I have not been as consistent in posting as I should have been. My blog is metamorphosing (very slowly!) into a new area, but I am still here!

Added to all of this I have been working together with my husband Richard on our new enterprises. We attended the Entrepreneurs Bootcamp run by Andrew Reynolds at the O2 Arena in London at the beginning of October and we signed up to Brett McFall’s Warp Speed programme.

The good thing about this is that we have begun to work together on this enterprise. We have different skills and if we put them together we can cover more areas. At the moment we are not as accomplished with this as we could be but by practising a little each day we can improve.

Isn’t this what life and business is about?

I had intended to write about our new enterprises in this post, but I think my musings have gone on for long enough now. I’ll start a new post about what we are doing and save it for later publication – now that would be a first! But in the meantime if you want to have a quick peek at what we are doing you can look at our Eminently Ebooks site or at our Positive Lifestyle Choices site. We’d be interested to know what you think about them.

So what are your ideas on this matter? Is it just because we are all human and have so much to do that we don’t dedicate the time we need to if we say that we want to have our own online business? Or are there other factors that stop us in our tracks?

I’d be really interested to have your feedback and comments on this.

Making your life a masterpiece (or follow your passion).

I’ve been rather quiet here of late apart from the occasional comment on a few blogs. I wonder if I have been missed?!

During the past month I have spent a great deal of time reading everything from classic books such as ‘Think and Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill to lots of information on other websites about financial literacy for young people and courses for writing all kinds of things from novels to ebooks, newsletters to short articles.

As you may know, these areas are where my real passions lie and I feel that I need to feed these areas as much as possible. However along with the two week break from school for Easter, which has meant that my usual schedule is disrupted, my research has kept me quiet here.

Is it possible for us to do too much research?

Well it can be if we don’t then get on and do something with the information that we have gained. After all as Alex Jeffreys said at the beginning of the course ‘You don’t have to get it right, you just have to get it going’.

I first came across this saying from Mike Litman, who is a very motivational writer, speaker and coach with his own inimitable style. He is currently doing a series of motivational videos on his blog and if you have not seen them yet then I suggest that you have a look at one of them here.

Mike says this in his video “Too many people follow money and not their divine assignment and they get screwed up in life” – does this ring true with you? I certainly does with me. I’m listening to him again as I write and it is well worth while listening to more than once!

“You know that there is something great about your life”.

“Chase the greatest you and give yourself the chance”.

We need not only to plant the seed and hope to reap the harvest, but also to cultivate in between these events and this is what I have been doing. “Don’t judge yourself on results, judge yourself on activity – make your life a masterpiece.”

Wow, that is such an inspiration to me. It has taken me a while to really move forward on this and I have felt frustrated and overwhelmed at times this week, but I hope that as you listen you too find the inspiration to do what is right in your life. Like Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent, what is your dream?

Take that step and follow it. Leave me a comment about your dreams. We can achieve them, if only we cultivate them.

Hilary

P.S. I planned to write much more in this post, but I feel that this is so relevant now that I will add further posts with other ideas later.

Please let me know where your motivation lies in Making Your Life a Masterpiece