the destineering blog

The Worlds Biggest Blog Party

Fed up with hearing about all the bad things going in the world? Then check out The Worlds Biggest Blog Party - an online event starting October 27th (make a difference day) and continuing through November 11th.  Each day party goers (bloggers) will blog about charity, philanthropy or event that is making the world a better place. They'll be encouraged to write about a person who is an inspirational leader or someone who just believes in helping others.  Now's your chance to talk about people that are making a real difference in this world.

List of personal development sites

I wanted to share this list of personal development sites with you that was compiled by life coach Priscilla Palmer. I haven't checked out all of them, but there are some great sites on there - so have fun exploring.

Tap into what you're gifted at via what you're passionate about

Take a look at this blog post on Life 2.0   I think it illustrates wonderfully how you can tap into what you're gifted at, via what you're passionate about. 

Discovering what you're passionate about can require some mental heavy-lifting...really thinking through the essence of what it is you love doing or being. But I find it's really worth the effort - as once you've tapped into what makes you tick, decisions become a lot easier to make and your sense of purpose becomes a lot clearer.

Funny thing I've noticed about life change

Funny thing I've noticed about life change - often people devote huge amounts of time trying to plan what they should do in the future...weighing up the pros and cons of various options and scenarios. I believe things become a lot simpler if you just focus (with complete honesty) on what you would like to be. Suddenly the 'how to' starts to become a lot clearer.

Perhaps Epictetus put it best:

"First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do"

Six Tips for Happiness

These tips I saw on The Happiness Institute's blog from Tal Ben Shahar (a Postive Psychology lecturer at Harvard) make perfect sense.

What age are we at our most creative?

Is there a time in our lives when we're at our most creative?  The answer, unsurprisingly, is it depends. If you're into theoretical physics, pure mathematics and lyric poetry your peak could be in your early 30s, but if novel writing, history, philosophy and medicine are your domain, it could be in your late 40s.  A bit of generalised interpretation on my part perhaps - but for a more thorough insight into this topic, check out the blog posted by Marc Andreessen (co-founder of Netscape), sharing the findings of Dr. Dean Simonton (Professor of Psychology at University of California Davis) who has conducted extensive research on age and creativity across a number of fields.

There were a number of fascinating observations, but the one that really grabbed me was that the odds of a hit versus a miss do not increase over time. The period of one's career with the most hits will also have the most misses. So your mother's advice holds true - the more you keep trying, the greater chance you will have of success.

The 5.75 Questions You've Been Avoiding

Michael Bungay Stanier, a good friend of mine, a previous Canadian Coach of the Year and also a Destineering Retreat facilitator has produced this wonderful 5-minute movie: The 5.75 Questions You've Been Avoiding. Made me smile - send it along to anyone you want to give a smile to.

The Top 10 Lies of Entrepreneurs

To those of you life changers contemplating starting your own business, you may well find these nuggets of info useful when seeking funds from your friendly bank manager or venture capitalist. Check out The Top Ten Lies of Entrepreneurs on Guy Kawasaki's site.

Play Fantasy Life Swap

On rainy Sunday afternoons (and there were many in England), my friends and I used to play a game which we called Fantasy Life Swap. Sometimes when were bogged down in the minutia of our day to day lives, we would enjoy coming up for air and imagining what other lifestyle possibilities existed.

Now you can play this game on your own or with friends or family. It’s particularly well-suited to couples, as it gives you the space to explore what each of you fancies doing with your life.

Here’s how you play it:

1. Think of 3 places you’d really love to live (places where you can imagine waking up on a daily basis, thinking “I really love it here”).

2. Fire up your internet and check out what your housing dollar, pound or euro could get you in each of these places. Many countries have multiple listing services where you can see at a glance what’s for sale at any given time (check out Canada's multiple listing site) Have some fun exploring all the sites out there that give you ideas on alternative lifestyle (Escape Artist always gets me thinking)

3. Brainstorm loads of possibilities for roles, ventures or projects you’d really love to do if you lived there. Think about alternative roles you've dreamed about - VocationVocations might give you some great food for thought.

4. Pick your favourite three ideas and fantasize what it would look and feel like if you were living that life. Try to articulate it as best you can. Make a note of them and if a few days later you still find yourself dreaming about them, do a bit more research. I created the Destineering Love Where You Live page to help you research some of the most popular destinations.

5. Be at peace with yourself that if you get to the point where you feel a stronge urge to change your life, you have the beginnings of a Plan B.

A word of warning. When I played Fantasy Life Swap six years ago, I had 3 places on my list:  Grand Cayman in the Caribbean, Vancouver in British Columbia and Tuscany in Italy.  Be careful of the power of intention. I lived for a spell in Grand Cayman, emigrated to
Vancouver and have recently found myself thinking about Tuscany a lot!

Take a different perspective on your life

I received this quote from Nancy Solomon, a fellow coach:-

“Someone else’s perception of you doesn’t have to become your reality.”

Wise words indeed - but of course, it’s so easy to take other people’s perceptions of you to heart.  Taking this theme of exploring yourself from another person’s perspective one step further, I wondered how other people might approach my day to day life if they were living it. So I started imagining how people like Mother Theresa, Richard Branson or Bill Gates would approach the challenges I face on a daily basis. No prizes for guessing how varied the imagined solutions were - many of them very useful. So I can highly recommend this creative approach - give it a go – it really helps!

Talking of different perspectives on day to day life, check out the diaries of Samuel Pepys (a highly acclaimed blog in the UK): http://www.pepysdiary.com/ This olde world perspective and peculiar language used makes me chuckle whenever I read it.