Tycoon Woman

How to be the wealthiest person on earth

2012-01-09T13:46:00.000Z

How wealthy are you? When you hear that question do you automatically start tallying all your physical assets? Are you thinking about the money you have in the bank or what your earning potential is? Are you thinking about any property you own, your car, the contents of your home? It is common to equate wealth to money and for many people when they think about how wealthy they are they automatically think of monetary assets.

Money and the pursuit of it seemed to dominate our lives. This is because we see money as possessing the power to provide us with everything we need physically emotionally and psychologically and even spiritually.

The problems arise when our beliefs about money start to impact on our lives in a negative way. Some of the problems that people have with money may sound familiar to you:

I am always arguing with my partner, it doesn't seem to matter what we start arguing about it always ends up with an argument about money. They never take responsibility for their spending and I'm always left picking up the pieces at the end of the month when they've overspent.
No matter how hard I try to budget or how much I earn, I always seem to be struggling to make ends meet and never seem to be able to have the money I need -it is as if me and wealth live on two different planets

I've worked hard to be in a position to afford anything I want - money is not a problem, however, I often feel guilty about how much I have. I’ve noticed that I tend to spend money frivolously – it's like I’m chucking it away in disgust!

I noticed that whenever I feel down I go out and buy myself something whether I can afford it or not. I feel happy for a while but then I start to feel as if something is missing again and before I know it I'm buying myself something- else usually bigger and better and more unaffordable. I know I shouldn't be getting into debt like this but just don't seem able to stop myself.

All these people have developed a duality in terms of their relationship with money. Instead of recognising money for what it is: a medium of exchange; a way of transferring value from one form to another; a way of tallying up how effective you have been at providing value to others (incidentally how effective you are at creating value says nothing about you as an individual -creating value is something you do. it is not who you are. As soon as you start to use money to put value on an individual's worth i.e. in terms of their spiritual, emotional, psychological and physical being, you step on to a very slippery slope.) Money can never be more than what we say it is. So it is important that we are really clear about what money really is and what it is not.

Quite simply money is nothing– nothing at all. Money has no meaning; indeed it has no value except what we give it.

In order to heal our relationship with money we have to first recognise that how we currently relate to money is not serving us, individually and collectively. The two biggest money issues in the world today are 21st century over consumption and belief in lack or a lack mentality. That is the belief that there isn't enough of anything to go around and that in order for some people to have more others will have to have less.

Wealth and abundance, far from being limited are boundless. There's enough in the world for everyone to have more than enough. A lack mentality drives you to overconsumption in the belief that there is not enough and therefore you have to grasp everything there is. These limiting beliefs about money mean that you are always chasing money, focusing on a lack of money rather than attracting abundance in your life. What we focus on we attract and therefore instead of attracting abundance into our lives we drive it away.

Limiting beliefs determine how much wealth and abundance you experience in your life. If you want a life of wealth and abundance, i.e. wealth well-being; healing your relationship with money is a way of achieving this. What's more because our collective money consciousness has created the world we experience today, by healing your individual relationship with money you automatically contribute to overall community well-being. You owe it to you yourself and your community to do your work to heal your relationship with money.

3 things you can do immediately to start healing your relationship with money:

1. Create a wealth narrative – your wealth narrative is your wealth story, how it unfolds is up to you. Think of creating your future experiences – everything you write will contribute to the new reality of wealth and abundance you are moving to from this point forward. Your wealth narrative is primarily a daily Journal. The process involves just writing whatever comes to mind without censorship, evaluation, judgement or even grammar. Based on the principles in The Artist Way by Julia Cameron, the idea is to write your daily Journal each morning and aim to write a minimum of three pages. This is a great way of clearing blocks and barriers to your creativity. You may never be fully aware of what issues are being resolved by using this process, however, you will quickly notice the benefits. Your thinking will become clearer and you will find that you are accessing creative solutions to issues that previously evaded you.

2. Identify your money mindset profile - The 9 money mindset profiles I have identified are based on my observations of how people I have worked with, lived with, mentored and coached interacted with money. In addition I have also drawn on the work of Deborah L. Price (a highly regarded financial advisor and money coach in the USA) in her book Money Magic.

The nine money mindset profiles, although described as a type of person, are really states of mind that create the characteristics of an archetype. Consequently these states of mind can be changed and along with the change in mindset comes a change in behaviour and attitude towards money. The mindset states are fluid and although some people may occupy a particular state for a long period of time, it is possible to progress through these states organically. However, the majority of people who get stuck in a particular state fail to shift it without external intervention.

This is because it is impossible to break free of your limiting behaviours and beliefs unless you know exactly what are the limiting behaviours and beliefs you are trying to replace. Do you spend more money than you have? Do you feel that you don't deserve money? Do you believe that you have to compromise your ethics to make money? Are you rarely contented with your financial situation? These are just a few of the questions that you will need to answer in order to begin to break free from your bad money habits and restore money harmony in your life.

You can take the money mindset profile quiz here http://tycoonwomen.com/money-mindset-profile-quiz/

3. Work with your money history: You have been conditioned by your environment, by what you have heard, what you have seen, what you have experienced. Unless you can change your programming or at the very least interact with it, it will continue to drive your thoughts which will drive your feelings which will lead you into taking certain actions, which will produce your results. By changing your programming you take the initial crucial steps to changing your results.

To start the process, look at your money history. What did you hear about money when you were young (your verbal influences); what did you see the adults and people around you do with money when you were young (what you learnt to model) and what significant moments did you experience with money when you were young (pivotal incidents).

Using this information as a starting point, write your money history. Think of it as your money autobiography and include as much detail as you can remember. When you have completed your narrative, use your daily journaling to contemplate and respond to the following questions:
What kind of relationship does your money history suggest you have with money?
Is the relationship you have the one you want and if not what would you rather have instead?
What does it reveal about your beliefs about money?
Are your beliefs about money limiting you or propelling you to success?

To find out more about how you can create money harmony in your life so that you can experience more true wealth and abundance; feel contented and happy and be free from the stresses caused by money worries download the free e report: “The seven secrets of money harmony: a proven strategy for creating personal wealth and increasing the flow of abundance in your life”. Or book your free no obligation taster session to see how you can benefit from money harmony coaching and mentoring program.

Getting clear

2011-12-04T11:31:00.000Z

There’s a song that goes "on a clear day you can see forever" when things are clear it is possible to see what you want, where you are going and even where you have been. Being able to clearly see your future life of wealth and abundance is an important step in the process of healing your relationship with money and thus being able to both create and attract true wealth into your life. True wealth is a combination of tangible assets (things normally associated with the idea of being wealthy in the world, i.e., money, property investments etc) and human wealth the intangibles that we value and often think of as priceless, (i.e., health, relationships, spiritual connection, happiness etc.)

Many people do not get to live a life full of true wealth and abundance because they are not clear about what it is they really desire or want for themselves. When you get clear you empower yourself because by really knowing what you want you have more choice about how to achieve it. Why? Because you will seek the things you need to make the changes. Clarity leads to more choice and more choice equals power. When you are clear about what you want you engage the part of the brain whose function it is to make you aware of things – the reticular activator. Your reticular activator is like a bloodhound, once it gets the scent of what you want it goes after it with a singular determination, seeking out the things you need to make it happen. If you want more wealth and abundance in your life give your reticular activator a regular workout by clearly stating what it is you want each day. The clearer the better. Think of the things you want like a menu and list all the things you need to create the life of wealth and abundance you desire. How much income do you need each month? What sort of home do you want? What sort of lifestyle do you want to be living? And once you've identified what it is you want; why do you want it and how will it make you feel if you had it. If you are able to associate positive emotions with your clarity, this will engage your reticular activator even more.

By taking the time to get clear, you will greatly improve your chances of achieving what you desire. An easy way of setting clear goals is to list them under the different areas of your life. So for example, under finance you might say “I will have a monthly income of X.” And under lifestyle your clear goal might be “I take three three-week overseas holidays with my family each year”. And under work you might put: “I own successful businesses that provide passive income of X per month.” Once you have your list of clear goals, write them out and put them somewhere where you can see them daily. Remember to read them out loud to yourself each day and visualise how you will feel and what you will experience when you have them. Then notice how the universe conspires to put in front of you all the things that you require in order to achieve your goals.

If you would like help getting clear on your goals and ongoing support to achieve them, please contact me to discuss how my coaching and mentoring programs can be of assistance to you.

How going to pot can make you rich

2011-12-03T02:02:00.001Z

Having a good relationship with money also means learning how to manage your money effectively. I recently came across a very good budgeting system which is based on the idea of using 6 categories or pots for allocating your expenditure. The idea is to split whatever money you have coming in into different ʻPotsʼ for different purposes. As money flows into your life, a certain percentage goes into each ʻPotʼ before you spend anything:

The 6 pots or categories are:

Necessities - 55% These are your day to day expenses and bills basically what it cost to live month to month , travel and petrol, food, toiletries and rent or mortgage payments, insurance policies , utilities the whole hog – As these are your biggest cost it’s the biggest pot and 55% of your income goes into this pot

Long term saving - 10% There is no point always wanting that house, car or holiday but never saving for it. So use this pot for saving for your dreams!

Investment - 10% This is your financial freedom pot, where your money works for you to create residual income. Use it to invest in shares, property, or put it in a high interest accounts. Seek advice about the best way to use this from and appropriately qualified person or better still use the resources in the next pot to improve your knowledge of investments so that you can effectively manage your long term investments yourself.

Education - 10% If you’re not growing/ developing yourself then neither will your bank accounts; so this money is for yourself improvement,i.e. training, career or personal development books, courses or mentoring.

Play - 10% All work and no play makes Jillian a dully sad stressed woman so we have a play pot – a pot for your treats – I can remember when I was a young single mum – yes there was a time when I was a single mum too; it was as if all my money when from my bank to my bills with nothing left for me. It was so depressing – you might not think that you can spare 10% for fun. So think about it like this – no fun and you will eventually implode so this is like life insurance making sure you keep happy and able to keep earning the rest of the money. This is your treat pot so make sure they are your treats too not the families alone if you using this system for family budgeting. It is very easy for women especially to get into that sacrifice, lack mentality and exclude ourselves.

And there is a golden rule for this pot! YOU HAVE TO SPEND THE ENTIRE AMOUNT EVERY MONTH!!!

Contribution - 5% Use this pot to make a contribution to a charity or organisation you care about or to support friends or family members. In this scheme it is set at 5% half what is suggested in the idea of tithing 10% - if you want to up this you could decide to reduce the necessities pot to 50%.

Although I’d not heard of this is system until very recently, I’ve always divided my money into categories. That’s because I follow 3 basic rule of money management

Live within your means
Save regularly
Invest regularly and wisely.

The pot system is also based on these principles. If you are attracted to the idea or still a little sceptical or if you don’t already have a budgeting system you are happy with; you could try the pot system out by using it on a cash basis. In order to do this you need to decide on your budget for the week take out the money in cash and divide it into the pots and see how you get on. After you got used to dividing your expenditure in this way you could then set up an automated system for your monthly salary/ income.

What is your strategy for managing your finances? Please share your experiences so others can learn from them.

Your wealth and abundance mindset

2011-12-02T00:21:00.000Z

Do you know that you are already rich? You probably just don't realise it yet, however, right now you have within your possession a multi-million pound asset, or indeed something money cannot buy.

Most people think of their personal wealth in terms of physical money and possessions; however what if you were to take a different kind of personal audit? What if you were to value what until now you have placed little value on a.k.a. YOU.

So let's start with your hands I'm assuming that you have two of them, and if by some sad chance you do not, you will have already been made very aware of their value. So how much would you say your hands are worth? Perhaps you think well not much, but if I were to offer you are £500 for one of them, would you sell me your right hand now? Possibly not. How about £1000 – is your answer still no? So we've established that your hands are worth over £1000 and given that you have two of them, that is £2000 already. So would you sell me both your hands for £4000? You're probably thinking “£4000, no hands ... Is it a fair trade?” I guess not. So what about your eyes; how much would you say the going rate was for a pair of eyes? £6000 per eye? £7000? £8000? Would you be prepared to sell your eyes for £10,000 apiece?

Clearly if you took stock of all your body parts that are healthy, functional and useful you would realise that your body alone is worth well over £1 million.

I call this type of wealth “human wealth”; the wealth all human beings possess but often overlook its true value. So how about you take a human wealth audit. Start with your body and then work your way down the list of your other assets such as your family, your friends, your experience, your knowledge, your skills and talents. No doubt you’ll soon realise that you are worth a fortune, yet possibly before now, you haven't taken the time to see the value that is locked inside you.

This is the reality that is at the heart of cultivating an abundance mindset. When you have an abundance mindset you are saying to yourself “Everything I will ever need or want is fully available to me– right now.” The most important and essential things in life are free and not only that, they exist in quantities where there is abundance for everyone. If you have enough, it does not deprive anyone else of their ability to have enough too.

However, because we often focus on what we do not have, we get stuck in a lack or scarcity mentality. Focusing on the things that we do not have that makes us feel unhappy or unworthy. Being wealthy is a mental state that comes from within and is rooted in sense of abundance, of have anything you may ever want or need forever without limits. Once you realise this, you will be able to start the process of making the shift from a mindset of lack and scarcity to one of abundance and limitlessness, which will herald in a life of true wealth and abundance.

What price would you put on your human wealth assets? I would love to read your feedback should you choose to do this exercise.

Creating your wealth narrative

2011-12-01T01:46:00.001Z

What’s your present financial experience? How harmonious is your relationship with money and how much wealth and abundance do you currently have in your life? Healing your relationship with money is the single most important step you can take to changing your financial circumstances. If you feel like you and wealth currently live on two different planets, this is your rocket ship to start your mission to boldly go where you have not gone before and seek out new planets of wealth. If you are currently programmed for lack around money, if your beliefs and values are causing you to unconsciously drive wealth from your life, here is one thing you can do immediately to break your programming, change your thoughts and feelings and so lead you to take the action that will produce the results you desire: a marvellous life of wealth and abundance.

Create a wealth narrative. Your wealth narrative is your wealth story, how it unfolds is up to you. Think of it creating your future experience – everything you write will contribute to the new reality of wealth and abundance you are moving to from this point forward. It is your proclamation of things to come and the resting place of things that no longer serve you. The wealth narrative will take two forms electronic and hardback. The electronic version is for recording, keeping and completing exercises that form part of the money harmony coaching and mentoring programs, should you choose to take this process further and join one of these. The hardback version is for you to write a daily Journal. The idea of keeping a daily journal is based on a proven practice for clearing blocks to creativity and personal growth described in The Artist Way by Julia Cameron. This beautiful and highly inspiring book advocates writing three pages first thing in the morning as a way of clearing your blocks to your higher creativity.

I have been writing a daily journal for many years. The process involves just writing whatever comes to mind without censorship, evaluation judgment or even grammar. Just write and write some more. Cameron’s book recommends writing 3 pages each day, however, I write until I feel a stillness starting to take over every other emotion. Sometimes this is more than 3 pages sometimes it is less. I write anything and everything. I pour out my heart not worrying about sentences or grammar and I just keep going until the stillness finally arrives. It's not like running out of steam because once I am still I don't always stop writing. Sometimes I start to write consciously and whatever I need to do next to move towards my goals, will suddenly become clear. It's like receiving an answer. There is no structure, no purpose, it all gets put down and what I require arrives. I feel deeply connected deeply at peace. I trust that whatever it is I need is already working its way into my conscious awareness and that it is already starting to impact on the systems that it needs to impact on. For me it is like lying on the beach at the edge of the shore, the sea lapping against me as if I were a rock, the tide gradually coming in. With each wave the water slowly rising until I am finally engulfed in stillness.

I highly recommend this process as a way of clearing the deeper more hidden issues that are less likely to surface consciously. You may never be fully aware of what issues are being resolved, however, you will very quickly notice the benefit. Your thinking will become clearer and you will find that you are accessing creative solutions to issues that previously evaded you. For your daily pages, find a journal or book that is larger than A 5. Whilst any book will do it helps to make it look inviting and special. When I was at school we were always asked to cover our exercise books. I recall that the books I had spent most time creating beautiful cover designs for corresponded with the subject I did best at. My mind was always keen to work with the nicely decorated books – by the second term I'd work this out and had recovered all my books with inviting exciting designs. Getting used to writing daily pages takes time and discipline. However it is worth sticking at it. What has worked for me is; although the aim is to do my pages first thing in the morning, because our minds are most receptive at this time, if I can't get them done then I make it is my intention to find space in the day and I always do. Proclaim to yourself that you will always do them and you will.

In terms of the electronic part of your wealth narrative, much of how we work these days is electronic because it is easier to record and index information and therefore look it up. You will need to do this with your exercises and so I suggest creating this part of your wealth narrative on your computer; however, there is nothing preventing you from using either your journal or pen and paper to complete them - the choice is yours.

An exercise you can do now is charting your money history. Create a 3 column table and in the first column list how each of your parents (or adults who were significant in you up bringing) acted around cash and their feelings and statements about rich people and being rich. In the next column for each parent, put down how you might be identical or opposite to them. Finally in the last column put down how this can be impacting on your relationship with money and your current financial well-being. Use your daily writings in your journal to consider the following questions:

What do you notice?

How much of what you currently do is just what you learned from your parents or significant carers?

What do you feel about this?

How does it still serve you?

What can you do differently?

It is not necessary to answer all these questions in a single day, use as many days as it takes to deeply reflect on these questions and your answers to them. Don’t answer them directly like an English comprehension exercise; rather hold them in your awareness and journal freely as usual.

Have you had any experience with journaling? Please share your thoughts and comments I look forward to reading them.

Powerful words that heal

2011-11-30T04:34:00.003Z

Affirmations and proclamation can be useful tools in helping to change your money mindset profile and thus enable you to re write your wealth narrative and attract wealth and abundance into your life. Your wealth narrative is the story you have programmed in your mind about your relationship with money. This is what determines how wealthy you are in your life; whether you measure your wealth in financial term or in human wealth terms (human wealth describes the intangibles such as happiness, love, peace contentment etc).

The difference between a proclamation and an affirmation is small and it is really a matter of emphasis. Whether you will work better with affirmations or proclamations will be dependent on your learning style and just how loud the internal dialogue in your head is. . The definition of an affirmation is: A favourable statement affirming that a goal you wish to accomplish is already occurring. The definition of a proclamation is: to state an official intent to take a particular course of action and acquire a particular status.

Affirmations are expressed as if the goal you set yourself is already occurring. Whereas proclamations aren’t stated in the present but rather express an intention to do or be something. For some people their minds are very sceptical about the idea that something that hasn’t occurred is real. Their internal dialogue or internal critic (the voice that is always looking to find the negative or cut you down to size) responds violently to what their conscious mind can clearly see is not the case. However, for others who are able to project themselves forward in time to when they have achieved their goal and look at it from that point – it is as if they are looking back in time, so that, in their mind they do indeed already have the thing they are affirming –daily affirmations are fabulous success tools for these people.

I am a great believer in horses for courses or what works for you. Rarely in life does one size fit all. All this does is result in something that is either too tight or over generous. The best person to determine whether you are an affirmer or a proclaimer is you. You will either know which one is for you are already, or if you don’t, experiment for a week , with one then the other and see whether or not you have a strong resistance to either.

A word of caution: Our natural tendency is to resist change and so you may find both uncomfortable to start with. Commit to choosing to work with one or the other so that your brain rules out the “they’re both rubbish” option.

The good news is that it is relatively simple to turn an affirmation into a proclamation or vice versa so you can use the very similar statements whatever method you choose.

Why are proclamations and affirmations such useful tools? Everything is made of energy and this energy travels in frequencies and vibrations. When we make a declaration in the form of an affirmation or proclamation these carry with them their own vibration frequency. When you say your proclamation or affirmation out loud, its energy vibrates throughout the universe. You can ground this energy within your body by touching your body at the same time you speak your statement aloud. Doing this allows you to feel its singular resonance which sends out a potent message to your subconscious. To get the most from working with affirmations and proclamations you should state your proclamation/affirmation out loud every morning and every evening and doing it while looking into a mirror will accelerate the process even more.

Below is a list of affirmations or proclamations which I suggested that you work with everyday to help heal your relationship with money.

All good things are now flowing into my life.
What I heard about money isn’t necessarily true. I opt to adopt fresh ways of thinking that support my happiness
All my investments are profitable and secure.
I release my non supportive money experiences from the past and create a fresh an rich future
Because I love what I do, I have become a money magnet.
I promote my value to other people with passion and enthusiasm
I always have more than enough money for all that I need.
Because of my great appreciation for money, success follows me wherever I go.
I always have more than enough money.
Being financially successful is one of the top priorities in my life, and I practice this feeling every day.

What are your thoughts on working with affirmations and proclaimations? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Looking good from the inside out

2011-11-29T02:20:00.001Z

Everybody wants to look good and why no?. When you look good on the outside you feel good on the inside. However, when it becomes an obsession. It can be extremely damaging and resulting in such conditions as addiction to plastic the surgery, eating disorders, low self-esteem, depression and even self harm.

A lot of pressures is put on women by the media, society and by western culture to look a certain way. Age seems to be a particular bugbear for women. Women age, Men mature. Women are bombarded by the cosmetics industry, which demand that women look perpetually young; the anti aging industry is worth billion of pound annually and to maintain profits each year the age of women targeted gets younger and younger. It is impossible not to grow older and given that this is the case why should it be unacceptable or less attractive to display the signs of a natural process.

How do you strike balance between looking good and being very comfortable in your own skin so they have the confidence to grow old gracefully. Learning to use your appearance to your best advantage so that you feel good about yourself and create the impression you want to create is something everyone needs to know, especially women in business as it could be the difference between making the sale or not.

The Internet is teaming with information on how to look good. Most focuses on external appearances rather than what goes on in on the inside. When you feel good on the inside it is reflected by your external beauty. This idea was taken to its logical extreme in the film Shallow Hal, the story of a vain shallow man who only went for good looking women, who is hypnotised so that he can only see inner beauty. Needless to say, all the people who previously would have been considered to be beautiful turn out to be old hags and the less attractive women turn out to be the supermodels. Whilst I can’t promise such drastic results, you will notice a significant improvement in how you look once you take hold of your negative thoughts.

Here are 5 ways to get you feeling good on the inside.

1. Tell yourself a great story. It's your choice. What story is running inside your head? Many people have negative stories running around inside the head. Voices that constantly tell them that they are wrong, they are nothing, they're no good. However it's just a story. And since it is just a story why have a negative story when you can have a great story playing around inside your head. Instead. Tell yourself a great story. One where you are the best you that you can be, where everything you plan to do is a fabulous success. You’ll feel more confident and relaxed and this will be reflected in how you look.

2. Developer an attitudes of gratitude. Look for things in life to be grateful for and to appreciate. Try practising hourly gratitude - each hour, find at least one thing that happened in the last hour to be grateful for.

3. Smile at everyone who meets your eye and keep smiling even if they don't smile back. At first you may find this a bit uncomfortable. However, if you truly smile from your heart you will eventually notice that the number of smiles that come back your way far outnumbers the ones that don't . Get you in the mood for smiling try doing something nice for another person every day, smile make it your aim to bring a smile to their face, it will put a smile into your heart

4. Put good things into your body and get your energy in energy out equation balanced. In other words, eat healthily and in moderation. The best diet advice I ever heard put it simply: variety is the spice of life, eat as many different coloured foods that you can. Aim to eat them in their natural state, or as unprocessed as possible.

5. Honour you Darth Vader days. Sometimes it's good to go with the flow and really be with what you're feeling rather than trying to put a happy face on. If you allow yourself to fully embracing what you are feeling, you'll be surprised how quickly it moves on. When I'm having a Darth Vader day one of the things I do is I make a list of all people I'm going get back when I obtain world dominance. The more absurd the things I’m plotting the better. So when you're having a Darth Vader day, allow yourself to have the biggest hissy fit ever in the privacy of your own company. You will eventually end up laughing at your behaviour and how ridiculous this strategising against people is. That is unless you are a true psychopath in which case this exercise is not for you.

What do you do to feel good on the inside? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-28T01:48:00.002Z

Limiting belief # 10: the rich get richer and the poor get poorer

A quick look at the distribution of wealth and resources in the world today would seem to reinforce this limiting belief. Over the last 10 years the gap in earnings between the top 5% and the bottom 20% has grown exponentially. We are bombarded with stories of CEOs excessive bonuses and pay awards, outstripping those of the “coalface” one hundred and forty times over.

The poverty focused money mindset is learned behaviour – hence if you are surrounded by wealthy people you will adopt the behaviour patterns and mindset of wealthy people which will open your eyes to opportunities and possibilities that you will not be aware of if you grow up in a poor neighbourhood where there is high unemployment and low expectations. When you are surrounded by poverty it is difficult although not impossible to see beyond the mirror of your environs.

The rich do not automatically get richer - most wealthy people continue to look for new and exciting opportunities to leverage their time and thus their wealth creation strategies. Where as poor people are often overwhelmed with their cirdumstances and so lack the emotional and spiritual resoucerces required in order to change their circumstances.

Even if there is some truth in this limiting belief it does not have to be your reality. You have the power to create your of wealth and abundance in your life. You may not consider yourself to be poor, however, if you don' t think as yourself as rich either,than growing poorer maybe the only realitity you experience.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-27T00:35:00.001Z

Limiting belief # 9: it takes money to make money

Whoever said "it takes money to make money" was most likely trying to justify accepting things as they were. It is easier to believe in this limiting belief and abdicate responsibility for changing your circumstances than to get of your bum and take action to do something about it. It doesn't take money to make money, what it takes is the ability to leverage what you have, your intelligence, talents, ingenuity and communication and networking skills. The truth is if you cannot make money without money you are unlikely to be able to make money with money!

There are plenty of people in the world with money who are desperate to invest in good ideas. Ideas are much more than valuable than money – as illustrated by Dragon's Den. If you have a good enough idea money will pour in. Work on generating good ideas by solving people’s problems and/or meeting their needs. Then seek enlighten parties to invest in them rather than looking for money.

It is often said that necessity is the mother of all invention so why not puit it to the test. Imagine you had to raise £4000 in four weeks from nothing; what would you do? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-26T00:15:00.001Z

Limiting belief # 8: you need to save your money in order to become rich

Whilst living within your means and saving money is an important element of a healthy money mindset; over emphasis on saving and budgeting tips the balance between trusting in abundance and focusing on scarcity and lack.

Over emphasis on scarcity and frugality tends to be the reaction of people who have lived through difficult times. The memory of their struggle with their finances leads to them being afraid of losing what they now have and as a result they hoard everything, afraid to part with any of their possessions no matter how redundant "just in case".

Money is an energy flow and energy flows need to keep moving or they become stagnant. Anyone who has ever smelt stagnant water will appreciate how unpleasant stagnant energy can become. The hoarding of belongings or overzealous saving in order to feel secure rather than maintaining the flow of wealth into your life, creates a dam that blocks it.

Both wealth and poverty are the result of your money mindset which creates the external circumstances you experience. Your thoughts, expectations and actions determine how much wealth and abundance you experience in your life. It is better to save from a place of abundance, respect and gratitude for the flow of resources into your life rather than from a fear of lack.

What things are you hoarding? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-25T23:59:00.000Z

Limiting belief # 7: money doesn't grow on trees

Possibly, one of the most common statements parents make to their children is the idiom "money doesn't grow on trees". My mum also used to say "whoever told you I am the bank of England was lying" as an alternative; I guess when she felt that the money-tree statement was getting tired and ceasing to have the desired impact. That is, to get us children to stop pestering her to buy us something which she'd rather not spend money on.

As recent arrivals to a country that promised economic opportunity which didn't materialise, my parents were strapped for cash, working in low paying jobs trying to raise four children. My mother came from a middle-class family and was used to having her needs met and so her way of dealing with lack was to get us children to lower our expectations.

Although actual money in the form of notes and coins does not hang like fruit off the branches of trees, there is a limitless supply of money because it can be created from nothing via new ideas and inventions for goods and services.

The money doesn't grow on trees idiom plays into the scarcity myth. The thinking goes: If money grew on trees it would be easy to come by which would mean everyone would have exactly what they required. However money doesn't grow on trees because everyone cannot be rich and we should be contented with what we have.

But the truth is that there is more than enough wealth for everyone to have more than enough. Indeed there is more than enough wealth on the planet for everyone to become a millionaire several times over.

Scarcity is an illusion that serves the interest of a small elite at the expense of everyone who has stopped visualising money trees. By believing in scarcity, you block the flow of wealth into your life. When you filter your world through glasses of scarcity and lack you simply do not see the opportunities for creating wealth and abundance. Choose to believe in money trees again and get ready for a bumper harvest.

What would you do tomorrow if you knew money was limitless? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-24T02:09:00.001Z

Muhammad Yunus

Limiting belief # 6: money wields power in a negative way

Whilst it is true that many people with vast fortunes also world a lot of power, true power comes from your ability to influence others with the power of your mind and the integrity of your spirit. Consequently it is possible to have power without money, but more interestingly it is also possible to have money and use it with the power of an inspirational mind to help others.

An example of the former is Nelson Mandela. Imprisoned as a terrorist, Nelson Mandela served over 27 years in jail, in virtual isolation. He had no money to speak of yet on his release, he was to lead a nation from a process of healing and dismantle the apartheid system. Nelson Mandela is one of the world's most revered statesmen, his charisma, self-deprecating sense of humour and lack of bitterness over his harsh treatment, as well as his amazing life story, has enabled him to inspire not only his people but millions around the world.

The story of Muhammad Yunus is a particular inspirational example of someone who used his money/power to help others. Yunus founded Grameen Bank and is famous for being the banker to the poor with his pioneering efforts in Microcredit or Microfinance (small loans to poor people possessing no collateral) where the poorest people of society are encouraged to rise above poverty. The innovative banking program provides poor people––mainly women––with small loans to launch businesses and lift their families out of poverty. In the past thirty years, microcredit has spread to every continent and benefited over 100 million families. Yunus was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006, along with the Grameen Bank.

However, Yunus remains unsatisfied. He believes much more can be done, if the dynamics of capitalism are applied to humanity’s greatest challenge, poverty. Yunus wants to take the concept of Social Businesses, such as Grameen bank, even further. Social businesses are just like any other business; but for social objectives and not for personal gain or dividend. The satisfaction gained in achieving the social goals become the only motive behind investment, and the business is evaluated according to that standard. Essentially it is a non-loss, non-dividend business aimed at social objectives – education, health, environment, whatever is needed to address the problems faced by society. The profits are retained by the business and help it to grow further. The whole thing is based on the premise that entrepreneurs can be motivated by social goals.

Yunus is a wonderful example of combining inspiration power and money for the benefit of the wider community and illustrates the transformational powers of The Mystic money mindset profile.

What are your thoughts on the concept of social businesses? Please share your ideas I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-23T23:07:00.000Z

Limiting belief # 5: you have to work hard for money.

According to the story of Adam found in the Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) God cursed Adam for disobeying the only rule in Paradise – not to eat from the forbidden tree. The curse was that Adam and henceforth all people would have to work hard for their food all the days of their lives. Pretty heavy guns – the whole of humanity punished for the transgressions of a single individual. This punishment would definitely not pass the test of fair and reasonable, let alone be considered proportionate to the crime, as required by today's standards of justice and fairness.

It appears that this is the root of the misconception about needing to work hard to earn money. Given that just over 54% of the world's population subscribe to these faith groups, it is easy to see how this idea has spread. Work only seems hard if it is something you are neither passionate about or enjoy doing. When your work is aligned with your values and passion, it doesn't seem like work at all.

"Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.”
Khalil Gibran

Indeed if you are in the right job, work will seem like play. Clearly perception is the key here. Work will only seem hard if you perceive it as such. Often when people work “hard”, they are less efficient than if they work smart. You are less likely to find effective smart shortcuts that make things easy if your mindset is stuck in the "work is hard" groove. There is a difference between putting in the required effort and working hard. Of course there will be times when more effort and resources need to be applied to get a particular result, however this is usually temporary and the results are significantly greater than the effort applied.

A corollary to the misconception that you have to work hard for your money, is the belief that it takes a lifetime to get rich. Most people who create fortunes have normally done so long before death or retirement. There are numerous examples of teenage millionaires who have got rich from using the Internet and a creative marketing idea. For example; Adam Hildreth was 14 when he launched his popular social networking site and had made over £2 million by the time he was 19 and Ashley Qualls created a £million business selling MySpace layouts to teenage girls.

Making money is hard work and becoming rich takes a lifetime only if you believe it to be so. As Henry Ford said "Whether you think that you can, or that you can't, you are usually right.”

What information or evidence are you discounting in order to hold to your belief that you have to work hard to make money? Please share your thoughts; I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-22T00:40:00.004Z

Limiting belief # 4: It is more spiritual to be poor.

This is another belief given to us by religious traditions. Many of the world's faith traditions contain stories of how the poor were blessed because they displayed humility in the face of trials or they sacrificed something for others. Poor people are seen as righteous and the rich are considered to be weak and selfish. Possibly the most well known reference to this comes from the Christian tradition when Jesus proclaimed that "blessed be ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven".

Obviously taken in isolation this approach gives the impression that it is more virtuous to be poor, however as with anything the key is balance. Clearly the great spiritual leaders were supported by rich benefactors as well as poor ones, because they required money to live in their community and pursue their spiritual mission. This suggests that rich people can also be deeply spiritual too.

Looked at another way, poverty or lack can be seen as a result of a blockage in our creative energy. Given that we already possess the capacity to accessing a limitless supply of our own internal resources in order to solve our problems, when we feel stuck or blocked it is because we are stuck in a less than resourceful state rather than because we don't possess the capacity to manifest in our lives what we desire. Hence poverty doesn't make us more spiritual; rather it can cause us to be less connected to our natural flow.

What are your views about rich people? Do you feel it is better to be loved and poor than rich and lonely? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-21T23:33:00.000Z

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-20T23:26:00.000Z

Our beliefs are what give our thoughts and behaviour structure. What we believe tells us how to act in any given situation. However not everything we believe serves us well. If our beliefs prevent us from taking action that will enhance our well being than they are what is termed limiting beliefs. Limiting beliefs about money block the flow of wealth and abundance into our lives. Over the next 10 days I will be looking at the top 10 limiting beliefs about money and their origins:

Limiting belief # 2: Rich people are dishonest

Once again the most likely origin for this belief is The Bible. Jesus is quoted as saying in Luke 18:25, Matthew 19: 24 and Mark 10: 25:

"For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God"

The implication here is, given the size of camels and needles the likelihood of wealthy people getting into heaven are zilch. As heaven is the place where only the pure in heart and righteous go, if it is impossible for rich people to get into heaven then rich people can't possibly be either pure in heart or righteous, and therefore they must be dishonest. Add to this that this evaluation of rich people's character traits was proclaimed by "the son of God", then not only is this assessment correct it is also backed by divine authority.

There are two approaches to challenging this limiting belief. From a biblical point of view, if you understand that the eye of the needle was in fact a doorway into the city of Jerusalem were camels had to be unloaded and drop their heads in order to access the city, the statement takes on a different meaning. Instead of it being physically impossible for a camel to pass through the eye of the needle, it actually becomes an everyday occurrence. Albeit that in order for a camel laden with goods to be able to get into the city one would have to take off its load and get it to bend its head.

The second approach is to look at the evidence. The world is full of extremely wealthy people who are philanthropists, who having built personal fortunes have set up foundations and charities to support others in need; people like Oprah Winfrey, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, to name three of the most prominent wealthy philanthropists in the world today.

Rich people do not have a monopoly on being dishonest any more than poor people have a monopoly on being righteous. By labelling the rich as something that is undesirable, i.e. dishonest, you set up an unconscious repellent towards money. As a consequence you will overlook opportunities to attract money and wealth into your life because subconsciously you believe these opportunities to be the road to you also becoming dishonest.

What are your thoughts about rich people? Do you see them as having different, less honourable character traits than “honest poor folk”? Please share your thoughts; I look forward to reading them.

Top 10 limiting beliefs about money that could be blocking the flow of wealth and abundance into your life

2011-11-19T02:24:00.002Z

Our beliefs are what give our thoughts and behaviour structure. What we believe tells us how to act in any given situation. However not everything we believe serves us well. If our beliefs prevent us from taking action that will enhance our well being then they are what is termed limiting beliefs. Limiting beliefs about money block the flow of wealth and abundance into our lives. Over the next 10 days I will be looking at the top 10 limiting beliefs about money and their origins.

Limiting belief # 1: Money is the root of all evil (Evil: that which causes harm or destruction or misfortune (noun))

It is likely that the basis of this belief is the Bible. Timothy 6:10 says "the love of money is the root of all evil". Given the dominance of Christianity in the West, this idea has been spread with the faith. It doesn't matter whether you are a believer; the idea that money is the root of all evil seems to be laden with social proof or evidence that supports this position. People fight, kill, destroy relationships and allow others to suffer in the pursuit of money or property, land, precious metals or any other possessions that money can buy. Once money became a, medium of exchange it was easy to make the link. So rather than the pursuit of resources for your personal use being the root of all evil, we simply think in terms of money.

However, money in itself is neither good nor evil. Money is a concept. It is an energy that can be exchanged for another energy. If you hold a £1 coin in your hand it doesn't burn a hole in it or transmit evil rays. It is a lifeless inert object. What is important is not money, it is your attitude and belief system associated with it. If your attitude is that you are prepared to do anything irrespective of who you might damage physically, emotionally, spiritually or psychologically; then the action you take to acquire the money you seek are likely to be very self-serving and at the expense of others. Depending on the extremes that one is prepared or needs to go in order to acquire the money they seek, it is likely that an objective observer might conclude that you/your actions are evil.

What do you believe about money? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Does your God want you to be poor?

2011-11-18T00:42:00.002Z

We have all grown up with ingrained ideas about money and our relationship to it. Much of this is a product of the religious or spiritual traditions we were exposed to as children. Unfortunately a lot of this is based more on economic and political agendas, which were woven into the foundations of our spiritual traditions in order to render the masses subservient to the will of their earthly rulers. As a consequence our thoughts about money have been skewed and do not serve us well.

Traditional Christian philosophies have interpreted Jesus Christ’s teachings about money to mean that it is honourable to suffer and poverty is a sure way to earn your pass to eternity with God in heaven. Other Christian beliefs have pushed the notion of predetermination and as such your position in life is predetermined by God, so there isn't anything you can do about it. Indeed the godlike thing to do is accept your lot, bear your cross and wait for your reward in heaven.

How you see God's involvement in the distribution of wealth will have a profound impact on your relationship with money and your ability to attract wealth and abundance into your life. Many people who have a poor or even disastrous relationship with money have unconscious beliefs about how God sees money and as a result how God sees them; even if as adults they wouldn't claim to have any religious leanings. Our subconscious mind hears and sees all; it is always vigilant, always taking in information. Furthermore it never forgets. Even if you are not consciously aware of holding any "spiritual" or religious beliefs about money, the dual nature of our consciousness means your beliefs are being affected by deeply held thoughts and ideas.

Therefore even if you are not “religious" as such, it helps to ask yourself who or what is God to you? When you hear the word God what image does it conjure in your mind. And if you were to juxtapose the words money and God how does doing this make you feel?

When I trained as an Interfaith Minister, I had to look at what my idea of God was and what my beliefs told me I should do in relation to how I treated others. This meant examining my beliefs about the distribution of resources in relation to others people. That is, was it wrong to be wealthy if others had nothing? Was not having money more spiritual than having money? Etc. I came to the conclusion that "God" did not want me to be poor. Rather it was better for me to be successful, openhearted and generous than poor and resentful.

History has demonstrated that the only benefit of being poor accrues to organised religion and "political leaders" (for that also read big business). In our culture being poor deprives you of opportunities to grow both materially and "spiritually". That is not to say that everybody who is poor materially is also poor spiritually, however it is difficult to move away from a lack mentality, which is spiritual poverty, if you are constantly bombarded with messages that tell you that money is "evil".

So who or what is "God" to you?

Has your concept of "God" empowered you or held you back in terms of your relationship with money and your ability to create a life of wealth and abundance?

A prayer

2011-11-17T01:20:00.005Z

I was searching through my interfaith ministers manual and I came across this prayer. I think I wrote it initially, however I just can't remember. It's very touching and beautiful so I've decided to share it with you. I hope you like it.

Healing my heart and loving God
I stopped loving well because when I first did it was not returned.

Instead I received only emptiness and pain and the longing I felt seemed like an eternal hunger that could not be fulfilled.

In pain, I chose not to love well, to put my heart in protective box.

Soft and cushioned on the inside, yet hard and impregnable.

So when you asked me to love You – I found I had forgotten how to love at all!

The childhood innocence was lost.

Doubt and distrust replaced my unconditional heart.

How do I remember my heart?

Do I allow it to open and love again like an intoxicated teenager?

To feel the freedom of love, the naivety that expects the love it offers to be returned completely – no withdrawing, no pain, no rejection?

I fear that mutual desire to be with another, the shared uncontrollable, unceasing longing.

Can hurt lovers trust again? Can betrayed love trust again and offer anew the first love and truly believe it will be returned?

Yet the crime wasn’t yours. You have not left me. You have not hurt me.

So why do I shut out the fire of Your love that even now wells up in my belly – desperate to move upwards to my heart and release it from the box of safety.

There is no forced entry; You do not come like a raider with crowbars and dynamite.

You simply ask me for the key. A lover’s voice so sweet and seductive.

I tell you my secrete, yet You always knew – the box is not locked!

So open my box and gently take out my crumpled heart.

Cherish and love it the way I the way I always knew You did.

So I can loose myself in your love, but more importantly,

So I can give it back in return.

Completely trusting that You will be a true lover for me.

How to be lucky!

2011-11-16T00:34:00.021Z

Unemployment in the UK continues to rise. Currently there are 1 million under 25s without a job and about 2 1/2 million other people also seeking work and those are just the ones we record officially. For some people these are really difficult times and the more they buy into the negative outlook presented by the media the worst it is going to be for them.

As implausible as it may seem, what you choose to think really does affect what you experience. Let's imagine that you are one of the unemployment statistics and right now you are without a job. If you think "gosh things are really bad, I have no money and no prospect of a job"; every day you hold this belief you experience this reality. Your mindset will present you from seeing any opportunities that present themselves to you.

To demonstrate this point, Prof Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire (2003) carried out some research into why some people get all the luck while others never seem to get the breaks they deserve. Prof Wiseman placed an advert in the local newspapers asking for people who consider themselves to be lucky to contact him. Hundreds of people volunteered. Prof Wiseman concluded that thoughts and behaviour were responsible for the good or bad luck that people experienced. Even when it came to chance opportunities “lucky people”, i.e. the ones who considered themselves to be lucky, consistently encountered such opportunities whereas the people who believed they were unlucky did not.

Prof Wiseman tested this by placing two large adverts halfway through a newspaper saying tell the experimenter that you have seen this and win £250. The message took up half the page and was written in a in a 2 inch font. In the experiment people asked to look for the newspaper and count how many photographs were inside. The lucky people saw the advert and claim their £250, whereas the unlucky people missed it completely. Being a scientist Prof Wiseman explained this result in terms of the affect of anxiety. Unlucky people are generally tenser than lucky people and this anxiety disrupts their ability to notice the unexpected. In other words their thoughts lead to feeling anxious which leads to them being less observant (the action) which causes them to miss opportunities (the result).

A negative mindset will also prevent you from putting 100% effort into what you do – it will show if you turn up for a job interview wearing the “there's no way they are going to give me this job” face.

Worse still if you believe that you do not have any money you will experience this too. Money has magnetic qualities. And the one thing that we all know about magnets is, if you put like poles together they repel each other. What this means is if you are thinking “I have no money” and you are actually experiencing having “no money” the two things act as repelling poles and you will find that what little money you have will rapidly be eaten up or simply slip away. Whereas being open to the abundance in the world/the universe, (as opposed to getting stuck in a lack mentality), acts as an opposite magnet pole to attract the opposite of what you are currently experiencing; increased money flow and abundance. Rather than your limited resources slipping away more is attracted to them.

Have you noticed that the moment you surrender to a situation that you are dreading, things immediately start to improve. This is because you are no longer projecting the energy of what you don't want. When you surrender and trust that what you need is available to you, then what comes to fill the space you have created by moving aside your wants is exactly what you require in that moment.

If you want the hard science, Prof Wiseman's research revealed that lucky people generate good fortune via four principles:

They are skilled at creating and noticing chance opportunities,
They make lucky decisions by listening to their intuition,
They create self-fulfilling prophesies via positive expectations, and
They adopt a resilient attitude that transforms bad luck into good.

Thoughts-> feelings-> actions-> results.

Many people find it difficult to accept anything that they cannot see or explain and so are ready to dismiss these universal principles. It's funny how the majority of us have no idea how the money markets operates or what forces it uses to determine who profits and who loses. However for years we have blindly put our faith in this system, no questions asked. I see very little difference between the two positions; both require faith in something you cannot explain to deliver you what you require. However one is predicated on the idea of lack and a few having exclusive access to a limited pie, whereas the other has infinite possibilities to provide more than enough for everyone's needs.

What is your luck identity and how has this impacted your life? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

6 ways money harmony and true wealth mentoring can create your financial freedom

2011-11-15T02:59:00.008Z

Money harmony and true wealth mentoring is a process that teaches the fastest and most direct route to move forward in your life or in your business, by helping you to break old redundant patterns of thinking and behaviours that are currently keeping you poor. And I don’t just mean in terms of notes and coins; poor; emotionally, psychologically and spiritually too. Money harmony and true wealth mentoring focuses on mastering the thoughts lead to feelings lead to actions and create results so that you are able to think the thoughts that enable money and wealth to flow into your life in abundance.

1. It Uses a Planning System

Money harmony and true wealth mentoring provides a space for you to get get everything out of your head and onto paper because it’s easier to move a thought forward on paper than it is in your head. Without a clear target to focus on outcomes are delayed and often not achieved at all. It would be like deciding to go on a journey to somewhere you’d never been before without any directions or a route map (GPS nowadays). Money Harmony and true wealth mentoring begins with ensuring that you have a crystal clear picture of your desired end state in mind. Naturally it doesn’t stop there, you also have to take massive action in order to create the wealth you wish to possess.

2. It helps you identify your big Y

“It’s easy to pay the price when the promise is clear.” Jim Rohn Money Harmony and true wealth coaching will help you identify your goal/ big Y, i.e. want to achieve, what type of life do you want to live and by when? This will help you to develop a strategy to put into action.

3. It helps you identify and clarify your purpose

It enables you to clarify your purpose in life. Once you can get down to the root of what it is that your are the most passionate about, what will drive you to achieve and give you a true sense of achievement. You reach a level of contentment that is unparalleled. Success is not just measured in terms of money. Happiness is far more valuable especially if you feels like you’re just not doing what you want to do in life.

4. It shows you where you’ve come from

A significant part of Money harmony and true wealth mentoring is uncovering your money history and the influence that this has had on where you find yourself now. This will help to make sure that you avoid repeating the old patterns in your money history and life which was the cause for their lack of wealth. More importantly, this also helps you to identify your strengths and how to deploy them for the maximum impact.

5. It will help you to develop strategies to spend less

Some people believe that if you set a budget and spend less you are not embracing the notion of abundance and limitlessness. However this is not the case. Behaving irresponsibly is not embracing abundance. If people really stopped and looked at all the money that seeps through their pockets on things that don’t provide lasting value, they would be shocked. Money Harmony and true wealth mentoring0 helps clients find ways to check their spending habits. Strategies like using only cash for purchases, collecting every receipt and adding it to a spreadsheet, or even creating a budget and sticking to it are good starts.

6. It holds you accountable

Money Harmony and true life mentoring holds you accountable for the things that you set as goals. Working with your coach/mentor on a regular basis will enable them to effectively chart where you are with each one and to take action to keep you on track.

How to stop feeling yourself into debt

2011-11-14T02:14:00.004Z

PHOTOGRAPH BY GEOFF WARD 2009

When it comes to money or the lack of it, a big determinant is how you feel. Many people use money as a substitute for emotions. Either they use it to make themselves feel better, more in control, more powerful; or their emotions drive them to act in a way that is contrary to their long-term best interests. Alvin Hall, the internationally renowned financial educator and TV/radio broadcaster in his book Money Magic: seven simple steps to true financial freedom; identifies the six most common feelings that drive people into debt.

According to Alvin Hall, our deadly emotions lead us to misuse credit. Because our emotions are a powerful driver, it is worth analysing your debt problems to see which of these unhelpful emotions are fuelling your debt issues. The six emotions are:

1. Denial. Denial let's you ignore your money issues and so you don't see them mounting up. The problem is that remaining in a state of denial can be terminal for your financial health. If you are being secretive about what you are spending or have started to tell half-truths or worse still lies, then this could be your signal to get help.

2 . Entitlement. The feeling that you deserve to reward yourself continually can be a sign of big trouble to come. If you feel entitled to treating yourself with purchases you can ill afford this could be masking a deeper need for recognition and appreciation.

3. Compensation. This emotion is driven by a feeling that your past has earned you the right to have the things you were previously denied. The deep sense of missing out can be a disastrous combination with a credit card.

4. Crowd – think. This is the herd mentality. I.e. you should be doing it because everyone else is. Therefore, instead of budgeting within your means, you are drawn into the consumer game and whip out your credit card in competition with your friends who are engaged with the same activities.

5. Empty hope. This is relying solely on the promise of better things to come, it is living within a fantasy, where you are rescued by a marvellous lottery win or a great pay rise. There is a fine line between believing in the abundance of the universe and simply ignoring your financial situation.

6. Finally we come to fear. This is the fear of maths and numbers. Many people considered that the number side of finance scary. They stick their heads in the sand hoping that things will go away by themselves. If you want to be able to handle money a lot better, a good place to start is with understanding your emotions. As Alvin Hall says, stop blaming someone or something else, take control of your feelings by being aware of what they are and then let them know who is really in charge.

What impulse purchases have you made recently – what were your feelings at the time. Please share, I look forward to reading your thoughts and comments.

Are you putting up with 10%

2011-11-13T03:43:00.002Z

You posses the most powerful tool in the universe, it’s your subconscious mind. Whilst you may currently find it difficult to believe especially if you are struggling to find answers to some of your more pressing problems at present; your subconscious mind knows everything. It has all the answers you require – the trick is to know how to use it correctly.

A common statistic banded around by the scientific community is that we only use 10% of our brains or minds. That means that we have the capacity of 90% of it that isn’t currently in use. Imagine you were asked to survive on only 10% of the calories you need each day. You would soon starve to death. Or if you could only use 10% of your lung capacity to breathe – there are many people with serious breathing problems who would tell you that would not no life. Or if you could only see 10% of the words in a book! 10% is such a small percentage of the whole that it is difficult to imagine how ignoring the 90% could in anyway be to your advantage.

It is incredible to think that we only use 10% of our minds to provide us with all the thinking that we do. Indeed it is quite amazing just how well we do on 10%. But here’s the thing – what if you could increase that by a mere 5%; given what you can do now that would surly put you in the genius league. I remember seeing a film once with John Travolta – one of the ones I suspect he’d rather forget. Anyway it was the story of a man who suddenly, due to a freak accident, had the use of 100% of his brain. I know it was science fiction but it did demonstrate the possibilities. For example he could learn languages in minutes, read books by looking at the page for a split second and even use his mind to move objects.

So why do we put up with using only 10% of our brain. I guess the answer is that we’ve got used to it because it meets our basic requirements. Also until relatively recently, before the advent of modern scientific equipment, there was no way to know just how much of your brain you were using.

The expanded use of our minds lies in our ability to engage our sub conscious mind effectively. Think of your subconscious mind as a perfect recorder. Everything it has ever seen heard, read experienced is stored there – even if you were unaware of the information going in. Consequently your subconscious mind knows everything. It has all the answers if you just use it correctly. It can lead you to a life of harmony, wealth, health, joy and success!

If you are still not convinced about the power you possess through your subconscious, try this little experiment. Before going to bed at night, programme your subconscious to wake you up at a specific time the next day by telling it what time you want to get up. Let's say you want to wake up at 7:00am. Before going to bed, tell your subconscious mind to "wake me up at 7:00am" and while saying this visualize a clock that reads 7:00. And sure enough your internal clock will wake you up at this time. Whether you get up or fall asleep again is a different story, but it works every time.

To use your subconscious mind to change your life you have to start making impressions on your subconscious mind. Using the same principle as the alarm clock start to tell your subconscious what you desire. One way to do this is to use affirmations, or you can sit in meditation and visualise what you desire. Your subconscious works better with feelings and emotions than abstract objects. So rather than sending it messages about things you want, focus on the emotional experience you will have as a result of having the thing or achieving your goal. For example if you want to attract more money flow into your life, concentrate on the feelings of wealth abundance and success, rather than money.

Whether you create an affirmation or sit in meditation, repeat the process several times during the day. It's best to do it in the morning when you get up and right before you sleep. This is when your mind is in an alpha state. Make sure you are really connected to the process and really mean it. It should not feel like something that is a chore. If it starts to feel this, take a break and remind yourself why you are doing it. Go back to your practice once you feel re energised about it.

If you need help with a problem or are in a situation where you have to make a tough decision and don't know which is the best for you. Ask your subconscious mind for help. You may say something like "Infinite wisdom of my subconscious mind, I ask for your help in deciding what is best for me now, I ask for your help and guidance in making a decision that is best for me."

Be still and listen to your subconscious mind. Close your eyes if need be and do not force anything to come to you but just be still and listen. If the answer doesn't come right away, that's ok. It's probably searching for the answer and it may take a little bit of time. Don’t worry; the answer will come…..maybe the next day or next week. You just need to be alert and open to receive it when it arrives. In my experience the answers arrive like a sudden moment of clarity and I just know what I need to do- as if I always did.

The answer may come from something outside of you, perhaps after you wake up. You may be clear in your thoughts on what to do. You may read or hear something that may enlighten you on what to do. You may receive your answer by running into a friend and she may say something that may help you decide. Just be patient and do not get frustrated and think too much about it.

Please share your thoughts and comments I look forward to reading them

What you think is what you see

2011-11-12T03:19:00.002Z

Remember that old chestnut about whether the glass is half full or half empty – well, we all know it's both. What determines how you see it is the filters you have chosen to look through. We think of seeing through our eyes when the reality is that we see through our thoughts. Consequently there really isn't any such thing as a single completely objective way of seeing things.

Today I was watching a video of myself which will shortly be on my website. Now I am super critical of how I look on film. As my husband is fond of reminding me, I've never seen a picture of myself that I was truly happy with. Hence I wasn't allowed to select our wedding pictures. I did manage to get my sister to airbrush a couple that she had put up on her website. Why not? It made me feel better. But I digress.

As I was saying, I was watching a video of myself with my highly critical eyes on. The first time I watched it I thought I sounded almost incoherent and my make up was a funny colour. However by the time I'd watched it 4- 5 times, each time with a different member of my family watching it with me, it looked like a completely different video. You see their positive feedback had gradually changed my perception of it and I could see more of the good points than the bad. We really do see what we want to see and what we see reinforces our thoughts.

Vision is really perception or projection. We think of information going into our brains from our eyes which tells us what we see, when in reality it's more like information coming out of our brains being projected into the world and determining what we see and in turn, what we experience.

Whatever you think you know is really just your interpretation of events and experiences based on what you choose to see. If you see lack and scarcity, then you will experience lack and scarcity. If you see everyone struggling to make ends meet, then you will experience that too. However if you see wealth and abundance you experience a life fulfilment and contentment.

On average we blink 25 times a minute. Every time we reopen our eyes we have another opportunity to see things anew. How do you start to see things differently? It's easy; first choose to be open to the idea that things are going to be better. It helps if you affirm this to yourself by saying aloud something like “I am willing to be open to the opportunity to see things differently. “ Then just be open. Whenever you change your mind, soften your focus and look at things with new eyes you will see things in a new light.

What can you tell yourself each day to soften your focus and look at things anew? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Our Money Matrix

2011-11-11T02:14:00.009Z

Have you watch the film called The Matrix? If you haven't, you ought to- it is this a good film. Not only that, the plot provides an interesting analogy on the way we live our lives. That is the majority of us are actually asleep – we have chosen to live in a dream world because the reality of the real world is so terrible that we would rather sleep through life oppressed than awake and start to heal the world our ancestors were responsible for destroying.

In the film, Earth as we know it has been destroyed by the robots human beings created to make their lives easier. The robots gain consciousness and become aware of their power, then turn on humans and enslaved them instead, using their life energy to fuel a pointless world. (it's not clear why without hearts and souls the robots wanted to control the world).

The way we use money today can be seen as the robots and our relationship with it is our dream world, our matrix. Your money matrix is the degree to which you are prepared to live in a dream world whilst the real world is held hostage by money markets. Every day we hear that the money markets are this or the money markets are that, as if they have a life outside the control of individual human minds and choices. We believe we have prosperity, yet all the while our ideal world is being fuelled by the lives of those born into poverty and subhuman existence. Rather than waking up and reclaiming our world, warts and all, starting again and this time creating something where everyone benefits, we live in a dream.

As in The Matrix, we really do have a choice over whether to take the blue pill or the red pill. In the film this choice given to our sleeping hero by the leader of the resistance, Morpheus. Morpheus points out that waking up isn't pretty, but it is the truth. Not only is it the truth, it is also the opportunity to restart again with a different more inclusive agenda. One which aims to serve all of humanity by being good for all or at the very least does no harm.

Given the chance would you choose to stay asleep in a dream world or wake up to the truth? Please share your thoughts, I look forward to reading them.

Gems on the 'net

2011-11-10T01:16:00.001Z

Every so often you come across some really touching and insightful gems on the 'net. Here’s one I thought I’d share with you. I copied it some time ago so I can’t even recall where it came from, so if you are the original author thank you for sharing. Enjoy!

“There is a story -- maybe an urban legend, but full of truth nonetheless -- concerning the famous violinist Itzhak Perlman. One evening, Perlman was in New York to give a concert. As a child he had been stricken with polio and getting on stage is no small feat for him. He wears braces on both legs and walks with two crutches. Perlman crossed the stage painfully slowly, until he reached the chair in which he seated himself to play.

As soon as he appeared on stage that night, the audience applauded and then waited respectfully as he made his way slowly across the stage. He took his seat, signalled to the conductor, and began to play.

No sooner had he finished the first few bars than one of the strings on his violin snapped with a report like gunshot. At that point Perlman was close enough to the beginning of the piece that it would have been reasonable to bring the concert to a halt while he replaced the string to begin again. But that's not what he did. He waited a moment and then signalled the conductor to pick up just where they had left off.

Perlman now had only three strings with which to play his soloist part. He was able to find some of the missing notes on adjoining strings, but where that wasn't possible, he had to rearrange the music on the spot in his head so that it all still held together.

He played with passion and artistry, spontaneously rearranging the symphony right through to the end. When he finally rested his bow, the audience sat for a moment in stunned silence. And then they rose to their feet and cheered wildly. They knew they had been witness to an extraordinary display of human skill and ingenuity.

Perlman raised his bow to signal for quiet. "You know," he said, "sometimes it is the artist's task to find out how much beautiful music you can still make with what you have left."

We have to wonder, was he speaking of his violin strings or his crippled body? And is it true only for artists? We are all lacking something, and so we are all challenged to answer the question: Do we have the attitude of making something of beauty out of what we do have, incomplete as it may be?”

What great inspiring stories or thought have you come across on your forage through the internet. Please share thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Tycoon Women

2011-11-09T01:32:00.004Z

Tycoon women offers training, mentoring and coaching to women to enable them to have a better relationship with money and as a result increase the flow of money and wealth into their lives. Typically my clients are women who are finding it difficult to manage their money successfully. Women who no matter how hard they work or how much they earn always seem to be struggling financially; as if they and wealth live on two different planets. I work with both individuals and business owners. My programs takes as a starting point that what we think leads to what we feel, which leads to how we act which then gives us the results we experience. It is based on principles that have been successfully used within NLP and coaching.

I focus on working one-on-one with individuals to address negative perceptions and limiting beliefs about money and financial security which have pre programmed them in terms of the way they react and treat money, normally to their detriment. A significant element of my programme looks at people’s money history and focuses on how by creating money harmony and personal harmony individuals can move their blocks to wealth by changing the conditioned responses that are currently determining what they experience. There have been many studies that have shown that the difference between people who are successful at managing their finances and increasing wealth in their life and those who are not, is to do with their mindset. For example the work of Napoleon Hill in his famous book “Think and Grow Rich” as well as more contemporary individuals such as Roger Hamilton founder of Wealth Dynamics and T Harvey Eker and his Millionaire Mindset programme.

If you are someone who find it difficult to manage the flow of money in your life this could be due to holding very limiting beliefs amount what money means to you and how money operates in your life. More and more evidence is emerging to support the notion that when it comes to our financial health, how we think and feel about things is the primary determinant of the experiences we have. Therefore in order for you to be more successful and experience more wealth in your life you have to literally think yourselves rich!. I appreciate that this may sound a bit new age and touchy-feely but the evidence behind this approach is sound. My programme is based on the proven strategies used by many other world renowned (an much more expensive) practitioners in this field such Harvey Eker and Roger Hamilton who have used the same approach to worked with people from all walks of life (the mega rich to the desperately struggling) to heal their relationships with money and help them create a “millionaire mindset” approach to their finances.

What sets my programme apart however is that it focuses on the heart - the spiritual centre or soul and recognises that beyond our conscious thoughts there is also a spiritual dimension at play. Thus my approach works with not only with the emotional and psychological dimensions it also includes our spiritual connection with money as well.

Many people believe that the way to wealth is predominantly through the head but without the heart the wealth that is created is self serving rather than good for all. If you have ever questioned the ethics of how money operates in our society, if you have shied away from your capacity to experience great wealth because you felt torn between the excesses of a society with an insatiable appetite for consumption and your need for balance and giving back then my programme will show you how to live a life of abundance which is in keeping with your core values.

Thoughts, feelings, actions and results

2011-11-08T02:49:00.001Z

I never liked the idea of predetermination. I remember studying it at school in RE and thinking “what a bum rap” if you were predestined to go to hell. The really horrible part was apparently there was nothing you could do about it. Fortunately when it comes to our future wealth, even if the cards are initially stacked against you, you have the capacity to change the trajectory of your wealth ship. If it is heading to planet poverty, it's possible to reset the course for planet wealth. This is great news because it means that everyone has it within their control to decide their financial fate.

The process is both tried and tested and very simple in its design. It's known as the procedure of manifestation and it goes like this:

Thoughts lead to feelings. Feelings lead to actions. And actions lead to results.

Your financial direction is a combination of your thoughts, feelings and actions as they relate to money. So how is the root of your financial journey program in? The answer again is simple. It developed as a result of the information that you collected as you were growing up. The main contributors to programming your financial route and deciding the journey you would take are your parents (or significant adults involved in your rearing); siblings, acquaintances, teachers, religious leaders, media, society – or basically any one and everything you ever encountered. It all had an impact. No one is born with a lack mentality or other negative attitudes towards money. How you end up feeling about and interacting with money is taught to you – or in other words you are conditioned by your environment.

Unfortunately your responses to your conditioning become automatic and they run not only your relationship with money but many other aspects of your lives too. Going back to the idea that thoughts lead to feelings,feelings lead to actions, which lead to results, it begs the question where do your thoughts about money and wealth originate from and how come some people think in terms of abundance while others are rooted in lack and not enough. Are you still following? This is where it all ties up. Your thoughts come from the data stored in your mind and the data stored in your mind gets their via your programming. Your previous conditioning will set you up for poverty if your thoughts are negative towards wealth. So by changing your programming you can take the crucial steps towards changing the results.

Your programming or conditioning towards wealth is absorbed by you in three distinct ways:

verbally – what you heard/listened to as children about money

modelling – what you watched people doing around money when you were young

specific incidents – what you experienced when you were young particularly pivotal moments that left a lasting impression on our psyche.

To change how you are programmed to think about your finances and therefore your financial future you have to:

1. become aware of what are your programmed thoughts/beliefs are

2. understand where your way of thinking comes from and recognise that it is not innate, i.e. that you have learned it

3. decide to let go of your programming because who you are now and who you wish to be in the future do not have to be conditioned by your past

4. lastly you have to recondition your thoughts, feelings and actions.

So for example:

Awareness: write down all the statements that you heard about cash, wealth and rich individuals when you were young

understanding: then write down how you believe the statements have impacted your financial life up to this point

disassociation: become aware of how these thoughts are made up of what you've learned from your environment and are not part of your original nature, they are not who you are. Asked yourself what alternative, more productive thoughts you can believe to support you in having a better relationship with money.

A big gesture: imagine you are taking an oath of allegiance to your new found freedom of thought and disassociation from past programming. Stand tall, place your hand on your heart and state:

”All that I've heard about cash and money and the people who possess it is not necessarily true or real. I choose to adopt a fresh way of thinking that supports my happiness and success”.

Now touch your head and then your heart and say “my mind and my spiritual centre are full of abundance! Wealth comes naturally to me.”

Trying to get back in alignment with your values can seem daunting, especially if there is a significant gap between your values and how you are currently living. As with all things in life they are a lot easier when you have a good support network and /or expert help. If you would like to explore how I can help your heal your relationship with money and increase wealth and abundance in your life I offer a FREE (no obligations) taster session. For further information please email me with your contact details at tycoonwomen@tycoonwomen.com

The 9 money mindset profiles

2011-11-07T02:52:00.005Z

The nine money mindset profiles, although described as a type of person, are really states of mind that create the characteristics of an archetype. Consequently these states of mind can be changed and along with the change in mindset comes a change in behaviour and attitude towards money. The mindset states are fluid and although some people may occupy a particular state for a long period of time, it is possible to progress through these states organically. However the majority of people who get stuck in a particular state fail to shift it without external intervention.

This is because it is impossible to break free of your limiting behaviour and beliefs unless you know exactly what are the limiting behaviour and beliefs you are trying to replace. Do you spend more money than you have? Do you feel that you don't deserve money? Do you believe that you have to compromise your ethics to make money? Are you rarely contented with your financial situation? These are just a few of the questions that you will need to answer in order to begin to break free from your bad money habits and restore money harmony in your life.

The 9 money mindset profiles I have identified are based on my observations of how people I have worked with, lived with, mentored and coached interacted with money. In addition I have also drawn on the work of Deborah L. Price (a highly regarded financial advisor and money coach in the USA) in her book Money Magic.

1. The Disconnected. These people are very childlike in their attitude to money. They remind me of my young son who is always pestering me for the next thing on his list of wants. He is never satisfied with what he has and possesses no understanding of how the money to pay for what he wants materialises. Indeed materialisation is how The Disconnected think money appears. This is not to be confused with manifesting. The Disconnected mentality is one of lack and grasping rather than abundance. As adults they are completely disconnected from any concept of taking responsibility for their finances and have no interest in learning about strategies to improve the flow of money or wealth and abundance within their lives.

2. The Sufferer. Sufferers see themselves as victims of society. They believe that they suffer at the hands of those who control money and blame their lack of money on others and their prevailing circumstances. It's the recession, wages are low, investments favour the rich, and society is unfair. While some of these statements may be true, the issue with Sufferers is that they shift all the blame externally and take no ownership of their own intrinsic power to increase the flow of wealth and abundance within their own lives.

3. The Chaser. These people chase money and in doing so drive it away. They are always dissatisfied with their financial situation, even if from the outside they appear to be extremely rich. They are always chasing after the next deal, the next investment. Again these money types, like the disconnected have lost connection with their "satisfaction" button. They no longer know how to feel satisfied or contented and believe that being satisfied is always one deal away.

4. The Crusader. These people have bought into the negative philosophy surrounding money. i.e. money is evil; money brings resentment and unhappiness; people who have a lot of money are greedy and selfish etc. These beliefs couple with low self worth lead to them feeling that they don't deserve money and others do. Either because others are more in need of money so they are more deserving or because they are more skilful at obtaining it. The Crusaders are lost in the intellectual theories around the idea of money; therefore, they fail to connect spiritually with the concept of true wealth and abundance being available to them.

5. The Maverick. Everyone knows a Maverick; someone who is careless and foolish with money. The gamblers who take chances with the family resources. Sometimes these people are literally gamblers, risking all on the turn of the card or the speed of an animal. Not only do they play fast and loose with money, they are also spent drifts with expensive tastes rarely able to live within their means. I am reminded of a former acquaintance that would spend days in the gambling house trying to win back the money he'd lost. And when he finally left empty-handed, he would go home via Harrods and use his credit card to buy the best T-bone steak to have for breakfast.

6. The Dreamer. Dreamers are too busy focusing on the more artistic and creative aspects of life to be really bothered with money. They are attracted to money because they recognise its power to give them the goods and services they need to pursue their art. However, they are at the same time repelled by money because they are afraid that possessing it may make them too materialistic and less creative. Dreamers also believe in suffering for their craft and clearly having money would go against this.

7. The Bully. Bullies use money to control others. Often misers, they lack generosity when it comes to keeping the flow of money going. If they are males, they are quite chauvinistic in their outlook and often use money as a way of oppressing their partners. Bullies shy away from close relationships with others because they don't want to share their resources. Often Bullies’ lives are filled with conflict.

8. The Sage. The Sage is wise with money. The pre baby boomer generations were full of Sages. People who knew how to “stretch” whatever money they had far enough to meet their family’s needs until the next links injection of cash. Sages have mastered the art of deferred gratification. They will save money and live within their means. Acquiring vast amounts of money is not an end in itself to Sages. Sages are connected to the idea of “more than enough” and are generally contented once they have achieved the goals they have set.

For many people becoming a sage is the end of the journey when it comes to achieving a healthier relationship with money. However Sages accept the limitations of their circumstances. They are wise with money but not adventurous. Sages have not taken the last step into true financial freedom and wealth, because essentially they operate from a lack mentality. That is they have not embraced the abundance available within the universe.

9. The Mystic. The ultimate goal in the journey to heal your relationship with money is to become a Mystic. Mystics tend to be emotionally sensitive, spiritually intuitive and ready to experience connection with their spiritual source, the God of their understanding. The Mystic desires connection and oneness. As a result they understand how to create, save and invest money. They have a strong and secure relationship with money and because they are clear about the spiritual dimension to money they do not feel controlled by it. Mystics are financially free, secure and are both materially wealthy and emotionally, psychologically and spiritually wealthy too.

Each of the nine states have particular characteristic behaviour associated with the thought patterns that they are driven by.

If you would like to explore your money relationship and discover what your dominant money mindset profile is, I offer a FREE (no obligations) taster session. For further information please email me with your contact details at tycoonwomen@tycoonwomen.com

Now it's time to receive

2011-11-06T02:14:00.002Z

Increasing the flow of true wealth and money in your life starts with having a mindset of abundance. However, there is little point in striving to cultivate an abundance mindset if you are unable to fully receive, i.e. to allow life to shower its richest gifts upon you.

The other day I was speaking at an event as a favour to a friend. The event came with a very nice but pricey network lunch and my friend, generously, offered to buy lunch for me. Instead of just receiving her gift, I said it was OK and that I would pay for my lunch myself. All sorts of equations were going through my head at the time, not least that I was concerned for her finances as I know times have been difficult for her lately. However, on reflection, I had to question why it was that I wasn't just able to receive her gift. Clearly she'd already calculated that she could afford to pay for my lunch or she would not have offered. I should at least credit her with having that much sense. The problem is contrary to popular belief, receiving is a lot harder than giving. Giving is easy because it puts you in control, not only of what you feel but also how connected you are to another person. Whereas receiving requires you to surrender, to totally trust, to be in the moment and embrace your vulnerability. To receive you have to be willing to let go of expectations, plans, pride, feelings of unworthiness and a lack mentality and wanting to be the struggling victim of your circumstances.

For some people not only are they unable to receive, they are also on a constant look out for the "too good to be true" genie, anticipating the moment he/she snatches away their good fortune? Take this short light-hearted test to determine how willing you are to receive more wealth and abundance flowing into your life.

When things are going well financially, i.e. income is flowing freely in your life, do you:

Start spending wildly just so things become difficult again?
Look every gift horse in the mouth to make sure he doesn't need expensive dental treatment?
Constantly check your balance to see why you have more money than usual?
Start hoarding your money because if you've got a surplus now, the bad times are just around the corner?
Wonder “what have I done to deserve this”, i.e., Am I good enough for this?
Get into fights with your partner about money even though there aren't any issues to argue about?
Self sabotage your performance, i.e. you are late more often, miss appointments etc and this starts to affect your business or your employee standing?
Here your parents voices in your head saying "pride comes before a fall" or "don't count your chickens" and other warning proverbs that remind you not to get too comfortable?
Buy yourself a fan, some sh*t and a rain mac because you just know that it's coming

Unless you are truly able to receive, life soon becomes about what you have sacrificed. You become resentful in your giving and often used it to manipulate and control others. Giving and receiving are as linked as breathing in and breathing out. One cannot exist without the other, indeed one without the other is not only pointless, it's fatal!

Being comfortable with receiving is an acknowledgement that there are no shortages. True abundance exists; however, this is masked by a lack of willingness to receive. Believing in lack is a security blanket to our own guilt which fools our perception of our true authentic self. When we are able to surrender and accept our authentic self our illusions of lack disappear because we recognise that nothing is missing and we are worthy of everything. When we are truly able to receive with grace, we realise that what we want is already here spiritually emotionally and psychologically.

To begin the process of becoming more open to receiving, start by asking yourself "what do I want to receive more of?" When you have answered this question take a moment to think of all the people who would benefit and how different your life would be if you allowed yourself to be more willing to receive? Then ask yourself what stops you from being a better receiver? As you ask yourself these question, notice your feelings and be willing to let go of any that do not serve you.

Receiving is a powerful tool for healing our relationship with money.

Please share your thoughts and comments I look forward to reading them.

The value of real wealth

2011-11-05T23:56:00.002Z

What is real wealth? Many people are fixated on the idea that wealth is money, i.e. the more money you have the wealthier you are. They then go one step further and conclude that the wealthier you are the happier you will be. The equation becomes:

Money = wealth = happiness.
Do you subscribe to this view? If you do, it is hardly surprising. We live in a community where everything is given a price. If you don't believe me, listen to the rhetoric of our politicians. It is a constant dialogue of cutting expenditure on services that benefit those with the least and policies that reward and encourage those with the most to hang onto it.

Every day we receive messages from our environment that reinforce the idea that money = wealth and wealth = happiness. Paradoxically we also receive the opposite of this message too. That is:

without money you are nothing, we do not value your opinions or care about your needs. If you don't have money you cannot participate.
Obviously no one says this directly however it is implied by the way in which our society works. Think of all the things that you need on a daily basis that are not available to you without money. Indeed apart from air (and not even fresh air at that) everything you need has a price on it. Specifically, everything “physical” you need has a price on it. This results in the majority of us coming to another conclusion: in order to feel valued you have to have money. The more money you have the more valued you will feel. Actually there real evidence is that self worth as little if not nothing to do with money. True self worth comes from within.

The problem with this pattern of thought is that it sets up a very confusing dialogue within people around money and their relationship with it. Money seems to mean everything and determine everything; yet deep down we know that we have a higher spiritual truth. That is our authentic self; our true worth is not determined by money. Because of the conflict we experience –

we need money to survive: money = wealth = happiness versus I am worth more than money: Money is not who I am

we don't know how to approach our relationship with money and as a consequence we end up repelling both money and our authentic true selves. This blocks both the flow of true wealth into our lives as well as the flow of money. In order to heal our relationship with money and our relationship with ourselves so that we experience abundance and true wealth; we need to start unravelling our feelings and values about money and who we truly are so that we have clarity and purpose again. When we are clear who we are, it is easy for us to reconnect to our higher self, to trust in the abundance of the universe and thereby attract into our lives true wealth and experience real harmony with money and our authentic selves.

The first step to breaking this pattern of thought is to recognise and challenge these ideas by being clear on our core values around money and what we want from our lives.

A-E of discovering your Core Values using the 3 Rs formula for inner discovery
• Reflect – deep thinking and introspections
• Reduce – reducing the list of options by choosing what is most important to you

• Reclaim – reclaiming the outcome as your own and taking action as a result

Reflect

A= Assessment: On a blank piece of paper write at the top ‘[your name]’s Core Values.’ Then answer the following question without censoring what comes out, don’t try to think positive or negative, just let it flow.

“What, in life, is most important to me?”

Once you have completed this task take a look at the list of common values below to see if any of these connect to the things you have listed down. Don’t worry if they don’t. It is perfectly ok to have a value expressed as a statement rather than a single word.

List of Common Values

Abundance Acceptance Achievement Adventure Aesthetics Appreciation Authenticity

Balance Beauty Bliss

Caring Career Cheerfulness Clarity Commitment Compassion Co-operation Confidence Contentment Courage Creativity

Daring Dedication Detachment Determination Devotion Diligence Discipline Discernment Discrimination

Empathy Empowerment Energy Enthusiasm Excellence

Faith Family Fame Flexibility Forgiveness Freedom Friendship Fun

Generosity Good will Grace Gratitude Growth

Happiness Harmlessness Harmony Healing Health Honesty Hope Humility

Inclusiveness Insight Integrity Influence Intelligence Intimacy Introspection Intellectual growth Intuition

Joy Justice

Kindness Knowledge

Leadership Learning Love Loyalty

Maturity Money

Openness Order

Passion Patience Peace Positive Power Prosperity Purity Purpose Recognition

Relationships Respect Reverence

Sacrifice Security Serenity Service Sharing Silence Spirituality Spontaneity Strength Status Support Surrender Success

Tolerance Trust Trustworthiness Truth

Understanding Union Unity

Wisdom Winning Wealth

B= Beliefs: Now that you have your list of words ask yourself, “what are my beliefs about [insert value] or what does [value] mean to me?”

For example if one of your words is money, your question would be, “what are my beliefs about money?” To which the answer could be, “money equals achievement, security, power and authority.”

By answering this second question you uncover your core or underlying values. In this example money is the means to being an achiever, or being more secure, or being powerful and having authority. These are the core values.

Reducing

C=Choice – Choose up to seven values from your long list. Select the things that are the most important to you in life. Once you have your short list rank them in order of priority. The most important first.

To help you indentify what is most important, look at each value in turn and ask yourself if you had to give up one of these values in return for happiness which one would you be prepared to sacrifice. Then eliminate the one you have chosen - this will be the least important – then ask yourself the same question for the remaining values. Repeat this exercise until you get to number 1.

Once you have your values ordered in terms of their priority to you create a single list and place it somewhere where you can see your list every day.

D= Describe – Now is the time to get really clear and specific. Using only the top 3 values on your list identify what successfully living to this value means to you. To help clarify this, imagine that you have travelled forward in time to your 90th birthday and you are looking back at your whole life. How would you know that you had been successful in living your values? What would you have achieved, how would you have lived, what would you have done? Use this information to complete the following:

1. My value:
“Success to me means . . .”
2. My value:
“Success to me means . . .”
3. My value:
“Success to me means . . .”

After you have identified what success means for each of your values create a narrative that weaves them together in an overall statement. Don’t worry if it isn’t perfect pros or poetry, it is your statement and so long as you are clear and you understand it that’s all that matters.

Now give yourself a huge pat on the back! You’ve just created a core values statement for your life.
The process you have gone through to get to it will ensure that your statement reflects who you are and what’s important to you. Many people not only don’t live by their core values they are also unaware of what they are and how they translate into standards for living their life. Now that you have your value statement, let it become your benchmark, your standard of the best you so that you live your life aligned to your core values. Make time to regularly evaluate how well you are living up to your value statement.

For example, if spending time with your family is important to you, and you work long hours and are too tired to engage with them when you get home, then the way you are living will be out of integrity with your values.

Regularly journaling about your feelings and meditation is a great way to do to assess the gap between your behaviour and your core values.

Reclaim

E= Examine – Now that you know what your core values are take some time to examine how well your current life reflects your core values. Using the wheel of life below look at each area of your life and give yourself a score out of 10 in terms of how well you are living your values in this area of your life. Where 10 is on track and 0 is not at all.

Over the next month make a conscious effort to evaluate how what you do is in accordance with your core values. Now that you are paying close attention you can intervene where necessary - i.e. when what you are about to do or say is out of integrity with your core values. Each time you do something that fulfils one of your core values write it down. By the end of the period you should have examples under each of your core values. At the end of the month re score your wheel of life. Continue with this process, month by month until how you live is fully aligned with your values.

As always all comments and thoughts are positively encourage :)

Trying to get back in alignment with your values can seem daunting, especially if there is a significant gap between your values and how you are currently living. As with all things in life they are a lot easier when you have a good support network and /or expert help. If you would like to explore how I can help your heal your relationship with money and increase wealth and abundance in your life I offer a FREE 1 hour (no obligations) taster session. For further information please email me with your contact details at tycoonwomen@tycoonwomen.com .

Why mum's and children always trump husbands and dads!

2011-11-04T22:59:00.000Z

Every now and then do you find yourself having one of those “good intention” days? You know, the days when you wake up determined to work through your well thought out list of tasks and must do jobs and somehow they just don't get done. Life gets in the way! Then again, life always gets in the way. The only cast iron strategy for getting what's down on your list done is to privatise it above all else.

Now this may or may not be practical. There really are certain things which trump even the most uber urgent and mega important items, especially if your tasks relate to your business or employee life. Like mums... Mums are the number one trump card followed quickly by children. However it seems like husband and maybe dads don't have the same trump ability. If you've played the game of trumps, husbands and dads are like having to put your King down because you don't have any cards in the trump suit, knowing that ace hasn't already been played!

So I guess it boils down to being flexible enough to trust that if your fabulously well-planned actions are sidelined by one of life's trump cards, you do what has now become your most urgent/important task and then re profile. Whilst hard and fast rules are great on paper, real life is about accepting flexibility is part of the game. A lot of people get very stressed out because they are hell-bent on being in absolute control of their lives all of the time. They confuse accepting complete responsibility for your life with the fallacy of control. The truth is that we don't have control; any that you believe you do is an illusion. Don't fret; it's like that for everyone so life is not out to get you specifically. Indeed it's not out to get anyone, life just is.

So we come back to living in the moment and accepting what is. Definitely the way to reduce stress in your life and enjoy the experience of living.

How good are you at accepting what is? Please share your thoughts and comments I look forward to reading them.

Counter acting negative messages

2011-11-03T23:59:00.002Z

There are endless numbers of individuals, family and friends only to ready to put their oar in and reinforce our self doubts. Someone once told me that for every negative message you hear, you need 10 positive ones to counter act it!

Ok – I’m going to assume that today, like most days, you heard at least one negative message – as there are so many flying about. Therefore, it follows that you will need a minimum of 10 positive messages and depending on the sort of people you are forced to interact with, perhaps considerably more. Even if you’ve been exceedingly blessed or very selective in your hearing and not heard a negative message it’s always good to have them in the bank.

Wouldn’t it be great if there were special agents or superheroes that went around randomly giving out positive messages to everyone? That way you’d be guaranteed of hearing some good stuff every day. The more superheroes there were the more likely it would be that you’d reach your total of 10 or more. Just think what a difference it would make if there was a marked rise in the level of everyone’s self esteem and feelings of adequateness and belonging. Given that all the angst in the world is the result of individuals projecting their own hurt and lack of self worth on to others; it follows that the more people there are who are confident and happy with themselves the less angst there will be.

So I’ve developed the special agent initiation process. It’s designed to turn anyone into a special agent or superhero with a mission to spread positive reinforcement everywhere. Here is how it works: Close your eyes. Now imagine you are the guest of honour at a fabulous event. Everyone has turned out to see you. They are all smiling and greeting you enthusiastically. Wow the love in the room towards you is so thick you can smell it and taste it. In fact you can just see it in the air as it is glinting like the light reflecting off a diamond. You feel so good so held that you just want to love everyone back.

You can feel the words of appreciation rising in side you. They are travelling up from your gut, moving through your chest and the higher they get the more appreciative they become. They are now in your mouth and you are bursting to get out these words of appreciation and gratitude. The desire to speak them is overwhelming. You want to love and appreciate everyone. You look around the room and see that it is an endless sea of people all loving and appreciating you and you just need to give it right back. So on the count of three, I want you to open your eyes and say your words of love, appreciation and gratitude so everyone can hear them. One... two... three!

Now go out and love and appreciate the world.

What other ways can you help heal negative messages. Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

A mindset of abundance

2011-11-02T00:01:00.001Z

When I left my high end five figure salary job last year, I knew that I would be entering a period of serious financial management. You see I had decided to start my own company and become self-employed. Despite the endless promises of making £1000, £10,000 or even £100,000 overnight (or within six weeks to 3 months if you were slow off the mark!); my experience as a senior manager who used to have responsibility for inward investment and business development (including start-up funding) told me that a much more likely scenario was that I was going to need to manage my lump sum final payment for between 18 to 24 months before I was in a position to replace my salary with the profits from my business.

You see not only was I going to work for myself; I was following my passion in a totally new direction. Therefore I didn't have a related network of potential clients to take with me. As if that wasn't enough of a "handicapped"; no sooner had I left work than the recession decided to take another large bite out of public confidence. And just to ensure that the escape box was sealed tight with no obvious means of escape - you know how stage magicians handcuff themselves, then put themselves in a sack, then lock themselves in a trunk and then suspend the trunk or from a burning rope high above the circus ring – well the incoming government decided to seal the final box, hoist the container and light the rope by announcing the severest austerity measures in a generation. Clearly it was going to be a hard struggle to grow a thriving business able to support my family in this climate.

I was taken aback, but not deterred. You see I knew that at the time of leaving my job I could describe myself as financially secure. That is I had enough savings to keep me going for more than six months, all bills were covered; I had no debts apart from my mortgage; I had adequate life cover and I had a range of investments vehicles that could be call upon if need be. In order to be in this position I had over the years learn to manage my money effectively and live within a specified budget. Years earlier I had decided to clear all my debts; credit cards, bank loans and overdraft facilities. Perhaps deep down in my subconscious I sense the move coming and my system was preparing for it. So by the time I left the security of a regular wage package I had the following:

no debts
6 months plus funding
insurance cover
a budget plan and monthly cash flow projections for both my personal finances and my new business. And probably the most important of all;
a mindset of abundance.

Since leaving work I have to admit that money has been limited, however I consider myself to be truly wealthy: A true tycoon woman. There have been times when I've not known where the money to cover my next month's expenditure will come from, however, just when I think that its time to give up and go back to the J.O.B something shows up. Somebody once told me that JOB stood for “just over broke”, however I was never just over broke when I had a salary because I managed my money well and was relatively highly paid. Yet what my job didn’t give me was a sense of satisfaction; a sense of knowing that this was my contribution; that I was living on purpose. The flow of money into my life when I need it is the result of my decision to adopt an abundance mindset.

Having an abundance mindset is to completely trust that there is more than enough for all and to reject the pie mentality. The pie mentality says that there is only one pie and therefore the more of the pie I have the less there is available for others. Therefore we must all struggle and grasp in order to meet and needs. Believing in abundance means that you trust the universe, God, your source to give you what you desire and therefore you can relax and be confident that all shall be well.

How do you practice abundance in your life, please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Musical instruments – the parents endurance test

2011-11-01T23:47:00.000Z

As every parent will tell you, parenting is a joy, and experience not to be missed. You learn so much from your children. They are like little Zen masters just waiting to expose you to the next lesson in tolerance, acceptance and transcendental meditation; I.e. how to completely disconnect from your immediate environment and go to a quiet noise free place of tranquillity: calm, calm.

However, there is one part of child-rearing which stands out as a test of endurance more than anything else that you will be required to do as a parent. It requires more tolerance than putting up with a terrible two-year-old, who is laying prone in the middle of the supermarket aisle, kicking and screaming because you refused their request for yet another pointless piece of plastic that the marketers deliberately put at ankle snapper height, just by the checkout.

More endurance than hosting the seven year old birthday party, including ice cream on your BOSE sound system (I don't have one but it illustrates the point); cake mashed into the carpet and sticky handprints on your walls. Double the endurance required to survive stroppy teenagers whose only form of communication are the words “Huuump”, “Urhhh” and “gosh that's not fair”.

What could be so bad... Yes you've got it – the little dears learning to play a new instrument! As parents we love to encourage talent. After all, who knows they could turn out to be very good at it, world-class even and that would be the pension sorted! Besides our job is to provide society with well adjusted, confident individuals and telling them that they have no talent and they should desist immediately really isn't conducive to developing self-esteem.

So whilst they practice the latest addition to their instrument collection you have to put up with the wailing that causes these every fibre in your being too recoil and sounds more like a hellcat on heat catcalling than any form of music you've ever heard. Thankfully my children are actually very talented when it comes to music so the learning/ screeching stage doesn't normally last that long. Although I do have my doubts whether their latest fad in instruments will sound nice even if it's played well. Let's hope they move onto the next thing quickly.

What instrument do you dislike the sound of the most. Please share, I look forward to reading your comments.

Credit card debt – scarier than Halloween!

2011-10-31T23:51:00.000Z

How would you describe your financial position right now? What criteria do you use to judge how financially secure you are? For example, do you consider yourself to be financially secure because you are managing to juggle your credit cards? You know how when you've got just enough balance on card X to pay the minimum payment on card Y and next month you use card Y to pay the minimum balance card X? You are managing, you've covered your debts or so you think.

What happens if you have a sudden unplanned expense? For example, a kitchen appliance needs repairing, or your car tax is due. You've no money put aside so you are back to the juggling. Perhaps you can pay for the shopping by cheque (unfortunately, this really isn't an option any longer as very few if any places take cheques these days). It could be that you can take advantage of the 0% interest for six months offer, if you transfer your balance to a new credit card, plus you can use the opportunity to extend your debt!

Sounds familiar? This used to be my world. I never seemed to have enough money no matter how hard I worked or how much I earned. It was as if money and I lived on two separate planets. Then one day I decided to change all that. I decided that I was no longer going to be a slave to my debts and I was going to clear them all one after another. There was a reason I was in debt and that was because I use my credit card to purchase things that I couldn't afford.

I couldn't afford them because I didn't have enough money saved to buy them out right. I had bought into the ideology that it was okay to buy now and pay later. Indeed, why wouldn't you? There are so many incentives to use a credit card to buy now and pay later. Payment holidays, 0% balance transfers, discounts off your first purchases, cash back schemes, extra loyalty points. Anyone would think it was a win-win situation. You win and the debt card company wins too. Not so – it's worth spending a moment to look again (or perhaps for the first time) at the nightmare that is debt/credit card debt.

Let's assume you have borrowed £6000 on your debt/credit card and each month you opt to pay the minimum of 3% of outstanding balance or £10 whichever is the greater. Take a look at the following example and weep – yes I mean weep!

Principal: £6000

Payment: £180 (3% of remaining balance)

Interest: £100 (£6000 x (1x20%/12))

Principal repayment: £80

Balance remaining: £5920

You are weeping because this calculation is done each month until you pay off the principal. That's always assuming that you don't top up your loan by spending up to your limit again. In the end you will pay £12,720 in total and it will take you 15 years to clear the balance. That is more than double what you initially borrowed. Furthermore 20% is just an illustration; it's not unusual to find some debt/credit cards with APRs (stands for annual percentage rate) as high as 33%.

If these numbers sounds scary, they are. Many people stumble blindly into the promise of by now pay later without giving serious full to the long-term consequences. Deciding to become debt free starts by looking at the values you have around money. What did you learn about money from your family, your friends, from society in general and how has this influenced you when it comes to using money that you don't have to buy things now?

Once you are clear about your values around money you can start to have a better relationship with it and in order to do this you need to tell your money story. That is the story about your personal history with money. Unless you can tell your money story so that you can examine it as an objective observer, you will continue to cling to the types of limiting beliefs about money that create debt and a mindset of lack.

3 basic rules for managing your money

2011-10-30T02:22:00.016Z

How we see money determines how we treat it and this in turn creates the financial circumstances we experience. Having a mindset of wealth and abundance doesn't mean being irresponsible with money and disregard the basic rules. The celebrity world is littered with tales of stars who have been forced to declare bankruptcy despite the fact of having earned hundreds of millions of pounds during their career. For example, Michael Jackson is purported to have earned over $500m; yet at the time of his tragic and untimely death, it is estimated that his estate was over $400 million in debt.

Far from disregarding basic financial management rules, a mindset of wealth and abundance positively embraces the realism of living within your means and being able to defer gratification. When you truly embrace wealth and abundance as a way of being, you no longer look to possessions to make you feel good. The need to constantly top up the feel good factor by purchasing more and more stuff is one of the strongest drivers for living beyond one’s means. Also living beyond your means plays into the lack mentality. You have to have it now because it may not be available by the time you have saved the money to pay for it.

The three basic rules for creating money harmony and financial security, which have served me well, are:

1. Live within your means,

2. Save regularly and

3. Invest regularly and wisely.

However, what if you haven't lived by these rules? What if you’ve always spent more than you had, never saved any significant amounts and you have not managed to put aside any investments for your nest egg? Scarier still, what if you are already over 40? Is it too late for you? Are you destined to live out your extended days either working until you are 80 or living in poverty? Well if this is you, the good news is that it's not too late to change your future. You have the capacity to create a future of financial independence now.

First things first, let's dispel the number one myth when it comes to marrying the idea of a wealth and abundance mindset to implementing practical steps to achieving your goal of a financially secure future. The myth that it should be effortless! We in the west seem to have got hung up on the idea that everything should be effortless and easy. Indeed if anything seems like too much effort and hard work (or “its long” as my teenage son puts it when I ask him to mow the lawn!) we are automatically turned off it. However the truth is that effortlessness is a process not a fixed state. Effortlessness comes after you have put the work in and built the foundation that enable you to leveraged your efforts so that your future return is significantly greater than the effort you put in now.

If you have left securing your financial future until 10 to 15 years before you reach the current retirement age, in order to catch up you will need to work hard at it. Not like breaking rocks in a chain gang, but it won't be like eating grapes on a Chaise Lounge sofa either.

The following diagram illustrates this point

So the good news is you can change your financial future by applying some concerted effort now. Moreover if you direct that effort in the right direction you can achieve your goal within 3 to 5 years.

What rule do you follow for managing your finances? Please share your experiences; I look forward to reading about them.

Trust in abundance but pay down your debts: 5 common sense steps to becoming debt free

2011-10-29T00:06:00.001+01:00

There is a saying in Islam -trust in Allah but tie-up your camel! The concept being that while it is right and proper to trust it also makes sense to have an insurance policy. Applying the same principle to your personal finances means that whilst the key to a financial secure, successful life is developing a wealth and abundance mindset, it is also prudent to manage the money that flows into your life effectively.

In the latter part of the 20th century western democracies became fuelled by debt. Instead of referring to it as debt we started to think of it as credit. Perhaps this was our way of masking the truth. How attractive does the idea of a debt card sound as opposed to it being called a credit card. The advertisers convinced us that credit was a good thing because it enabled us to have whatever we wanted now. Previous generations had to work hard, save and most crucially, WAIT to own the expensive objects of their desires. It seems odd that we now think of it as being unusual to have to wait for something, however, this was our experience for generations and approximately two thirds of the world’s people still operate like this today.

Clearly buying things can bring a great sense of joy and if you are purchasing goods for this reason it will seem tempting to use money that you don't have in order to feel good. However, if you buy something to feel good, how long does that feeling last? For example buying a new pair of shoes may make me feel good the first few times I wear them but after the fifth or six times they become old and the good feeling fades. If we base our feelings of happiness on material possessions we create a never ending process of having to buy things in order to make ourselves feel happy. If our resources are limited then it is easy to see how we can end up in a vicious cycle of debt fuelling our feel good purchases.

If you want to live a debt free life one of the things you can do is to seek professional advice from a financial adviser. However, there are some common sense steps that you can take to use your existing resources to systematically reduce and eventually eliminate your debts over a period of time.

Step 1. Decide to get out of debt.

The hardest part of getting out of debt is the decision to do it. Many people dream of being debt free however few are willing to go through the hardship and delayed gratification required in order to achieve it. There's no getting away from it, getting out of debt takes discipline. The old saying: the way to hell is paved with good intentions is particularly applicable when it comes to getting out of debt. It is easy to start off well intentioned and then what do you do when your friends call you to invite you out for an evening meal and going means breaking your budget and extending your credit?

The solution is to know why you are doing it. If you're why is big enough and strong enough this will give you a reason to stay on course – it is self fuelling motivation. So once you have decided that you want to get out of debt take some time to write out why this is important to you. One way of doing this is to write yourself a letter from the future describing what your new debt free life is like. What have you been able to achieve now that you no longer have any debts? What impact has knowing that you no longer have any debts had on your feelings about yourself, about others and on your relationships? Make your description of your new debt free life as vivid as possible. Then carry your letter around with you so that you can refer to it when you need staying power.

Step 2. Assess your current financial position

Whilst it can be really scary to take a long cold hard look at your finances; unless you have the knowledge about what is truly going on you will not be in a position to understand what you need to do in order to become debt free. So take a deep breath and asked yourself the following questions;

What are your total earnings?
What is the true cost of your living expenses?
What is the total of your liabilities, i.e how much money do you owe?
How much do you have in savings?
Do you have any assets?

Step 3. Create a budget

In order to know how much money you can put towards your debts you need to create a budget. Use the information from step 2 to create a budget listing all your items of expenditure, which will include money you pay towards debts as well as money you save. It helps to organise them under headings such as housing costs (e.g. mortgage/rent; property tax), transportation (e.g. car tax, travel to work, fuel), utilities (e.g. gas, electricity, phone, Internet etc), insurance (e.g. life, building and contents, appliances); living expenses (e.g. food, entertainment, pocket money, credit cards etc). The important thing is to choose headers at you find easy to use. The objective is to create a user friendly tool that you will use on a regular basis to manage your budget.

Step 4. Pay off your most expensive debts first

For home owners usually their largest debt there is their mortgage. Even though mortgage interest rates are low compared to other debts, because they are scheduled over many years a considerable amount of what you pay back is in interest. If you pay a little extra on your 25 year loan each month you can save a lot of interests. Often it only takes making one additional monthly payment each year. Doing this can pay your mortgage off a few years earlier which will save you thousands of pounds in interest. A simple way to do this is instead of paying your mortgage once a calendar month; pay it every four weeks, i.e. 52÷4=13 payments a year.

Step 5. Heed the advice of your credit card provider and pay more than the minimum payment each month

You may have noticed a statement on your credit card bill that says: "if you make only the minimum payment each month, it will take you longer and cost you more to clear your balance". Guess what – they’re right! In addition all the time you will be paying very high (and sometimes even exorbitant) interest rates on unpaid balance. By increasing the amount you pay towards your credit cards you can pay the money back sooner and pay less.

What strategies do you use to manage debt? Please share your experiences so others can benefit from them too.

Reconnecting to your source

2011-10-28T20:04:00.000+01:00

Have you ever tried meditating? If you’re like me busy, busy, busy, you probably feel that you do not have time to meditate; that is sit quietly allowing your head to empty of the millions of thoughts that race around your mind every second and embrace your higher consciousness. Indeed you might feel that all this touchy-feely mumbo-jumbo stuff is just for the happy clapping people who have time to examine their navels. There was a time when I felt that, however, I realise that apart from sleeping, (when I was out of it) my brain never got get a chance to rest, to mull over the deeper questions that I had or to reflect on my day and what sort of impact I had made.

I am a spiritual person in that I believe in a connection beyond myself (what I refer to as my source) and so as part of my spiritual practice I do take time out each day to be still, or meditate or pray. Even without the spiritual dimension there is great benefit in setting aside time to give your mind a rest from the business of your life and allowing space to reflect on your higher purpose and what you bring to the world. Quiet reflection gives you an opportunity to learn from what has gone before; to turn down the negative voice in your head that is always criticising and questioning your knowledge and expertise and to reassess and evaluate the path you have chosen.

Without quiet reflection I found myself repeating the same behaviour patterns, getting the same results and not knowing why. I began to believe my inner critic and I found myself heading in a direction and I no longer knew where was going or why was going there. Meditation and quiet reflection enabled me to get clear and when you are clear you can see the way ahead.

If you’ve tried unsuccessfully to meditate before, here's my strategy.

Set yourself a realistic goal. If you've never meditate before trying to be still for half an hour and an hour for the first time can be quite daunting. Therefore start with perhaps 15 min, long enough to get some benefit but short enough not to become irritated with the process before you have mastered it.

Sit quietly. By “sit quietly” I mean find somewhere as quiet as possible. This doesn't have to be in absolute silence, but in front of the TV or a radio playing in the background doesn't cut it. It has to be quiet and somewhere where you can be undisturbed. If you live in a household where everyone thinks that you are the font of all knowledge and as soon as they encounter a need for information that requires them to think through more than one level of logic they make a dash for you oblivious of anything that you may be doing and they may be interrupting, I suggest you hide in the bathroom.

Note on Levels of logic: 1 level of logic = I can't find x. 2 levels of logic = I can't find x, where did I leave or last see x. 3 levels of logic = I can't find x, where did I leave or last see x; x must be where I left it!

Now that you are sitting quietly allow your mind to play, to do what it normally does, wonder and explore thoughts. When I first tried to meditate my mind was all over the place. If you have a busy life sitting quietly will initially have one of two outcomes. Either your mind will say – “great now I don't have to multitask I can think about all the things I have been mulling over in the background -what were they are yes..” And then your head will explode with millions of disconnected thoughts one after another.

Or your brain will say "wow thank God for that! Some quiet time at last – might as well make the most of it” and it switches off and goes to sleep. For our purposes neither of these two reactions is what we are aiming for. I aim is for our minds to let go and relax. Let go of all the thoughts and get to a place of stillness, of comfort of just being. It's not without any thoughts at all, it's just not full of busy planning your day, arranging dinner, balancing your bank account, planning your holiday, reviewing your customer list etc thoughts.

It's welcoming of the stillness and so if you find other thoughts occurring, then you gently asked them to go away and your mind doesn't react in rebellion. It simply allows the extra thoughts to melt away. It may take some time to get to this point. If at this point your mind opts for sleep don't fight it. Sleep and when you awake simply thank mind and body for the rest. If you get less than 8 hours sleep per night; commit to going to bed 5 min early each day for three weeks until you are getting to bed and hour and a half earlier than previously. By doing this your mind knows that it can get the rest it needs in the time you allocate for sleep.

Practice sitting still for 15 min for at least 30 days. During this time you're aiming to be able to sit quietly in the stillness, your mind relaxed becoming more and more empty of the busy thoughts.

Once you are able to sit in quiet reflection for 15 min as described above, you can start to extend the time. There is no magic number i.e. you don't have to be able to sit in meditation for half an hour or an hour or two hours, it's really what works best for you and you will find your natural equilibrium. I found that if I sit too long, I go full circle and come back to the busy mind again, which is my cue to stop.

Sitting in quite reflection has enabled me to open up to my inner wisdom and to connect to a deeper consciousness and what I call my source. However, if you're not comfortable with this term think of it as a way of connecting to your authentic self, to your inspiration and to your passion.

I hope that you find this helpful, please let me know how you get on. I look forward to reading about your experiences.

Don't get it right get it done!

2011-10-27T19:08:00.002+01:00

I’ve got new sister. I adopted her (she’s age 47), so now she is part of my family. She's auntie to my children, an addition to the sibling pool of five – now six; and a new daughter to my mum. It's nice having a new sister, Carole.

Anyway today we were talking, like sisters do, about my tendency to perfection. (Okay I admit it's more anal retention.) I can get overly fixated on detail and consequently sometimes I just don't get it done at all. But now I’ve seen the light. Thanks to Carole I realise that getting it right is like painting that bridge they always refer to when describing endless thankless tasks. My old self would have spent time looking up its name – to get it right. Not the mew me. You get my drift so who cares what it’s called!

I’ve been liberated by my new motto – don’t get it right; get it done, because actually there is no right. There is correct, i.e. it meets whatever formal assessment standards it's measured by; but right is subjective. Right is based on your beliefs and values and if they are stopping you getting things done, then they are what's called limiting beliefs. Beliefs, although can develop in an instant, because they lodged themselves deep within our psyche, they can take a while to shift. It takes practice, i.e. practising some other belief that gives you what you want. So from now on I'm getting it done. My new belief: “done is the new right" or something like that. It's not perfect, but it's done!

By the way what do you think of the new colour scheme for my blog? As always I welcome your comments and look forward to reading them.

Hold on its coming

2011-10-26T19:47:00.000+01:00

Ok in order not to break my uninterrupted stint of posting a blog everyday since 50 days before my 50th birthday on September 3rd 2011 , I am posthing this brief holding blog now and will fill it out when I return from taking my son to the cinema. Motherly duties call and I'm sure you understand that sometime we have to do what we have to do to maintain our relationships. Until later then.

Disrupting the rhythm - how to be in the moment

2011-10-25T23:44:00.002+01:00

I have been learning tae kwon do for almost 4 years now. I'm glad to see that I've progress through the ranks and I am now one belt away from being a black belt. I recall when I first started; every muscle in my body hurt before, during and a long time after each class (the before being the result of the previous lesson). It seemed like I went from pain to more pain as opposed to lesson to lesson. However slowly and steadily I got less and less stiff after each lesson; I lost weight; got fitter and after persistence, dedication and hard work I am the proud wearer of a red belt with a black stripe. Indeed I have got so familiar with the patterns or poomse -the set moves you do pretending that you are fighting an imaginary opponent - that I can do them in my sleep.

However, today our instructor, freshly returned from a weekend seminar, informed us that new standards had been introduced by the governing body. We now had to do our poomse to a more fluid rhythm, one which reflected the intention of each combination of techniques. Instead of doing it to the count of one i.e. one beat for each move; we would have to be aware of what the natural rhythm was i.e. should it be 1,2 or perhaps 1,2,3 or even 1,2,3,4. Yes you've guessed it, it totally threw me. The new rhythm meant that I had to become consciously competent again. In other words, pay close attention to what I was doing and basically wake up and focus.

I had to be consciously in the moment rather than unconsciously going through the motions at the cost of precision and indeed meaning. The new way of doing the patterns actually made sense and I became aware of the fluidity and connection between moves that I had been previously oblivious to.

The experience got me wondering how much of my life is conducted on autopilot because I have become over familiar with people activities and even emotions. For example I know I love my husband, but most days I just take him for granted because I have forgotten how intense the feeling was initially. And how often do I give him part of my attention rather than being completely connected with the moment because I am so familiar with our conversations that I have in effect stopped listening.

Whilst autopilot and multitasking are great time-saving tools, overusing them can cause you to miss out on what is really important in your life - quality time with yourself and others and being really present each moment. The more deeply and clearly we are able to connect to our own reality and that of others the easier it is for us to accept the way that things are. Being fully present also improves the quality of your communications and relationships because you are fully engaged and playing close attention and so you notice more of what is being communicated to all of your senses. Other benefits include:

Improves focus, concentration, and precision.
Heighten clarity of your thinking and intentions.
A greater sense of flow and deep peace of mind
Less stress and a greater ability to manage stress.
You become more aware and accepting of your authentic self.
Increases resilience to change.
Boosts self-belief and self-confidence.

There are many techniques you can use for staying present. Not least the one I was forced into at my class this evening. Force yourself to break with routine and do things differently so you have to pay close attention to what you are doing. One very nice method I came across uses tapping. Here’s how it works

Sit quietly for 5-10 minutes. Assign your right hand to be the future. Your left hand represents the past. Your aim is to remain in the present moment. Every time your mind leaves the present, tap yourself gently with the corresponding hand. That is if you find yourself wondering into the future tap yourself with your right hand and vice versa. See how long you can be fully in the now. At first you may end up slapping yourself madly like a drummer in a heavy metal band but your ability to stay present will improve with practice.

How present are you? Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

Creating Money Harmony

2011-10-24T23:53:00.001+01:00

How are you living your life right now? Are you adding real value to your life by living your truth, by being authentic i.e. Being the real you?

These days, because so many people are afraid to be there authentic self, it is rare to meet people who are truly in love with their life. Most people you meet aren't happy with either who they are or the life they are living. They feel that they are not rich enough; they don't have the body they want; they don't have the job they want; or the success and money they believe they deserve and so they are unhappy and dissatisfied. How does this happen? It happens because most people are living outside of their values. Deep down inside they know what is most important to them but they allow life to get in the way and tell themselves that they have to behave contrary to their values in order to cope with their current circumstances.

For example, people say that they want to spend more time with their family and then they spend every waking hour at work. They say they want to have a fantastic body and great health and then they fill themselves with poor quality food and make poor nutritional choices. They say they value the truth and they tell anything from great whoppers to "harmless white lies". They say they value financial security, financial freedom and financial independence and they are out of rapport with money and are precarious with their financial management. Are you one of the people who say they value all these things but is doing other stuff?

Many people believe that everything will come right and they will be happy if only they had more money. They believe this because of their money history. Money has taken the place of hope in their lives and in some cases of their faith or God. The most unrealistic thing to believe is that money will make you happy. The truth is that it is not possible to earn your way to happiness or financial freedom. To believe that if you make more money you would be happy is to believe that money in itself has power and energy. Yet we know from our experience that it doesn't work this way. Wealth is not defined in monetary terms but by knowing your top 3 to 5 values and living them wholeheartedly.

The key to a successful fulfilled life is to be able to say that you are being the best person you can be every day. Each day you become a little kinder, a little more loving, a little more giving, a little healthier, a little wealthier; by bringing all of yourself to everything you do every day. This is more than just bringing your effort. It also includes bringing your integrity, your honesty, your intellect, your ability to get cooperation from the people who you need to work with and to acquire the resources you need to employ.

Living contrary to your values takes you out of harmony. Whatever you want in your life, to have more money, to have a better body, to be happier, to have a better job, to have a great home, whatever you want in your life the key to manifesting it is twofold. The first is to create money harmony and the second is to create personal harmony.

The following exercise will help you to take the first steps to bring more money harmony back into your life by allowing yourself to be comfortable with the idea of having financial independence.

Imagine that you have won the lottery. Now record your answers to the following questions:

1. How much money exactly did you win write down the number?

2. How does it feel to possess all this money?

3. Now that you have all the money you’ll ever need how much you plan to live on each month?

4. Are you going to tell everybody about your win or keep it a secret?

5. If you're going to keep it a secret, what is your reason for making this choice?

6. If you're going to tell everybody, what is your reason for making this choice?

7. How you going to spend the rest of your life, i.e. now that you are financially free what are you going to do with your money and your time? Write a plan for the next three years. Make it specific and clearly identify each step that you need to take.

8. What elements of your plan are central to your happiness?

Now that you have written a plan for your wealth, extract those aspects which are not dependent on winning the lottery. Write these on a separate piece of paper and spent some time each day in quiet reflection meditating on how you intend to manifest these in your life. Trust that your intention and attention will manifest the things you have identified in your life.

A brief history of money- Part 1: These coins are a good idea ...

2011-10-23T23:49:00.003+01:00

We used to make, grow or find everything we needed. What was around us was all that there was and if we couldn't find it, grow it, gather it or hunt it we didn't have it. Then one day it occurred to someone that they could exchange what they had too much of with someone who had something that they needed and who wanted what they had. Barter or exchange was the first form of transaction or trade.

The next step in the development of money was the realisation that transactions did not have to be between the two parties who needed the goods. For example three people A, B and C : A has what B wants but B doesn't have what A wants. However C does. A can trade with B and then trade B’s goods with C. This was all very fine, but then the problem became carting around bulky goods as they were cumbersome and it was dangerous – you could be easily identified as having something valuable and then robbed. Having a medium of exchange would make life so much easier. And the concept of money was born. Easily transportable, valuable objects.

The choice of currency has changed over time and between communities. According to the archaeological and historic evidence, money in the form of coins began between 560-546 B.C.E in Lydia. The Lydians made standardised gold and silver coins which they use for trade, creating the first retail markets and giving people much greater access to goods. People were now able to buy not only what they needed but also what they wanted.

For centuries money continued to be made out of precious metals and therefore had intrinsic value. Unlike barter, which relied on established connections and mutual survival, money broke down these social relationships. People also became more divorce from the labour required to produce the goods they needed. As a result their view of the world and their values changed. For example whether you had food was no longer solely dependent on forces beyond your understanding such as weather patterns and the will of the gods. Whether you ate now also depended on if you had money to purchase what you needed from the merchants who were able to bring goods from much further afield.

As wealth grew people began to have more leisure time to pursue activities other than those required for basic survival, such as artistic and intellectual activities. Having more time to contemplate had a profound influence on our creative potential. Money had provided a fertile soil for the seeds of these new intellectual, artistic and spiritual thought patterns to flourish and grow.

Unfortunately, as money spread across the ancient world, so did greed, overconsumption and overindulgence. The dominant power in the Western world at the time was the Romans. The Roman Empire is noted for its decadence and hedonism. The Roman fighting machine was able to add considerable wealth to the ruling class and so rather than become producers themselves the Roman Empire relied heavily on the outside world for almost all its goods.

Caught in a cycle of war and extravagant living, the Roman Empire imploded in the 4th century C.E. Money was seen as the cause and as a result the world turned its back on money. During a period known as the Dark Ages, few if any trade was conducted using money for almost 1000 years. This was the beginning of our mistrust of money in the collective human memory. Our mistrust of money was further reinforced by its continuing rocky history following its reintroduction at the time of the Crusades and still haunts us today. Part 2 to follow.

Money rapport

If you are finding it difficult to attract sufficient money into your life it could be as a result of having poor or no money rapport. Rapport is a word used in psychology, therapy and coaching. It means "intense harmonious accord". It is characterised by harmony, conformity, accord or affinity. It refers to a relationship of mutual trust or emotional affinity. Having a harmonious relationship with money and your finances is an important element of living a balanced and healthy life. Healing your money relationship enables you to build a consciousness of abundance which can become a self-fulfilling prophecy in the same way as having a consciousness of lack, scarcity and grasping can.

Your relationship with money is as much spiritual as it is physical and emotional. Healing your relationship with money is a journey of self-discovery as you explore the dynamics of your values and beliefs about money that impact on your life. The ultimate goal is to recognise that your authentic self is not defined by what money can buy or give you because you already possess the power to manifest whatever you desire.

What does having money really mean to you?

If you were to win the lottery tomorrow, in what way would the quality of your life be affected?

Please share your thoughts I look forward to reading them.

How many people can you know in a life time?

2011-10-22T23:49:00.001+01:00

Over exposed, I feel totally over exposed. So many people want to communicate with me I just don't know what to do. I'm sure human beings were not designed to have so many connections. Before towns, cities and technology when we use a live in small communities, the total number of people the average person meet in a lifetime was probably less than 50, maybe a 100 at the most. Nowadays if you were to work out how many people you had contact with; and by connect I mean meaningful interaction (i.e. where you were in contact with the person on a regular basis for more than a month) I reckon it must run into the hundreds. Possibly over a thousand.

Using my life to date as an example starting with school:- There were about 30 – 35 children in every class in my primary school (when I was at school class sizes were large and there was no policy to reduce them either) and there were three classes in every year group. Therefore, that 7x 30x3=630. I didn't know every child personally but I reckon I knew at least a third of them (I was notorious, not in a bad way, I just like being in school plays and playing netball) which would be 210 connections.

My secondary school was considerably larger. There were 1200 pupils on the register, although like all schools at the time we had our share of the kids who never showed up. I remember there were 5 in my class; I can even recall their names. The teacher would call the register and there would a familiar silence when she’d arrive at one of their names. Year in and year out these girls were a no show. Nowadays children services would be round their houses like a flash, however back in the day such children just got lost in the system. Typically these kids would appear once for the term, which means that they wouldn’t meet the criteria in terms of constant contact for at least a month. Consequently I’ve removed them from the calculations. That would account for about 100 pupils across the school. While still notorious, I didn't know more than a third of the school personally, so I estimate that I probably had about 260 regular contacts.

Then there was sixth form. My school was part of a consortium with six other schools and this brought me into contact with another 15 or 20 people. University possibly added another 450 as I was president of the African Caribbean Society and I can't even begin to imagine how many people I've met during my working career so let's call it an even 600. That would be 1, 841 people that I have connected with in a significant meaningful way.

But what about all the people that I have met more briefly i.e. exchange names at a networking event; spent a few hours with at a meeting or maybe even a week collaborated on the project. This number must run into the tens of thousands.

To make matters worse I network, I actively seek out people to meet and exchange information with. No wonder my head hurts, is just too many people. It really isn't possible to know the whole world, however, the numbers really start to get silly when you add all the people who I want to connect with or they want to connect with me in cyber space.

I'm struggling with numbers in the 100s, but there are people who have over 70,000 followers on Twitter. How long would it take to contact 70,000 people? Is it even possible to count to 70,000? I'm sure that somewhere there's one of those trivial facts which is goes something like ... If you started counting from the moment you were born to the moment you died and died aged 90; you wouldn't have counted to 70,000 , or something similar.

We seem to have gotten so used to living with big numbers that we have forgotten that they actually don't mean anything. They are really wholly unrealistic. I submit that is not possible to read 400 new e-mails every day or respond to tweets from each one of your followers if you have more than 25. Do you have time to post 25 tweets yourself each day – really I mean reading the tweets and writing your own response - no automation at all? That doesn't even include all the other social media platforms. How many groups are you in on Linked in and Facebook? What about all your connections there? And let's not forget the newsletters and RSS feed updates that also require your attention. I'm beginning to think that we have created a daemon called social media which is slowly consuming our lives.

I used to scoff at my friends who refused to join a social media network and now I envy them.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts.

The things you can do with pipe cleaners ...

2011-10-21T23:47:00.001+01:00

A great way to learn anything is to watch someone else do it. The more you observe the more you absorb. Eventually there will come a point when you wil have unconsciously learned the skill and hopefully you will have the confidence to give it a go all by yourself.

When my youngest son, now 12, was under five he had a habit of asking us to buy him new toys all the time. Obviously not wanting to give him the impression that everything he asked for was available on tap, we’d tell him that he had to wait until his birthday or Christmas. One day, instead of asking me to buy him the thing he wanted he asked me if I could make it for him instead. I've always been good at creating things out of "junk" so I accepted the commission. This was the beginning of a long list of things that I'd made him out of cardboard rolls, left over bits of wood, plastic bottles etc.

I made him everything from a space shuttle to the characters in Harry Potter. Blue Peter presenters were amateurs compared to me. When my son was about 7 he stopped asking me and started making the models himself. He has made characters out of Sellotape using it to construct 3-D shapes, stuck objects together with duct tape to create costumes and weapons (he's forever making swords); but now he's favourite medium is pipe cleaners. The things he makes out of pipe cleaners are characters in his electronic games or from television programmes. They are very impressive so I’d like to share some of them with you.

I'm sure my son would welcome your feedback.

The art of lying

2011-10-20T23:45:00.002+01:00

When I was a child it was common for parents to smack (well actually they were more like beatings) their children. Literature was full of examples of corporal punishment and even the church advocated a sound whipping in order to control "naughty” or” unruly” children. Spare the rod, spoil the child. So naturally it didn't take me long to work out that it was best to avoid getting caught doing wrong. For me it was getting caught that was the issue because I quickly realised that there was a Grand Canyon of difference between what I considered to be "wrong" and what adults did.

My initial strategy was to lie. I used to lie about everything. "Who knocked over the vase?" "Not me" I'd say knowing full well it was me. Unfortunately, lying is an art and there are rules to lying successfully. My problem was that like many children I was unaware of what the rules were.

Basic rule of lying No.1: denying something you are observed doing is stupid beyond imagination. Especially if you deny it to the person who observed you doing it!

Few if any of us have Jedi powers of mind control;"I am not the child who broke the vase" doesn't work so if you are going to lie at least be smart about it.

My lying days were short lived. After a few unsuccessful attempts at lying and getting punished twice; once for the wrongdoing and once for getting caught lying, I decided that I might as well tell the truth and throw myself at the mercy of my parents. "Please I'm sorry; I promise I won't do it again". Then one day I accidentally dropped and broke one of my mum's favourite glasses. It was part of a set which she only took out for visitors and I was putting them away for her because they'd been left on the side. I was mortified. Luckily no one was around to see me so for once lying was a realistic option. My younger brother was the champion glass breaker in the household, so I concluded that my mum would automatically blame him. Moreover, as he was also a serial liar; when he denied it she wouldn't believe him. Finally I had a win-win strategy. The moment of truth (or more accurately, lying) arrived and I was just about to use it when something stopped me. Lying had never worked in the past. So instead of claiming it wasn't me I simply confessed. “Yes it was me - it was an accident I'm sorry”.

To my complete shock and amazement, all my mother said was “thank you for telling the truth, try to be more careful next time”. Wow, I remember being so stunned that I just stood there with my mouth open for a good 2 minutes. The truth had worked. From that day I decided never to lie again and I’ve stuck to it almost 100%. I have to confess that I have on occasion omitted certain facts (so as not to be unkind or cruel) but ever since that day I think I've only ever said something that was completely untrue once.

I mention this because my youngest son is the worst liar on the planet. Not only does he frequently break rule No. 1, he clearly has not mastered any of the other rules either. Such as rule No. 2: even if you are not observed committing the “crime”, leaving a trail of evidence which leads directly to you and then lying about it is even more stupid than breaking rule No. 1

Telling the truth makes life so much easier. You don't have to remember what you say and to whom because it's the truth so all you have to do is tell the truth again. People like and trust you because they know they can rely on what you say. Therefore you have better more open and honest relationships. Having lots of people who like and trust you is great for your self-esteem.

Just in case you aren't convinced and you still see lying as a viable option (clearly my youngest son falls into this category) I thought I'd share the final basic rule of lying with you.

Rule No 3: Karma, natural justice, what goes around comes around. Call it what you will, the universe has a limitless capacity to bring back into balance that which has been put out of balance. Therefore, somewhere down the line, the lie you told will eventually catch up with you and you will have to pay the consequences. Be warned!

What is the most ridiculous lie you've ever been told?

Do you lie your way out of difficult situations or face the music with honesty? Please share your thoughts; I look forward to reading them. a

A good case for pylons

2011-10-19T23:43:00.000+01:00

Today I feel on top of the world, but thoroughly shattered. I guess that is what I get from getting up at 5 AM. Not in itself exceptionally early, but a killer if you only went to bed at 2:45 AM. I'm not going to go on about having lots to do; instead I'm going to completely changed tact today. I will come back to the history of money and how we can heal our money relationships later or should I say soon (note the way I am being deliberately vague in order to keep my options open).

Anyway, what caught my attention this evening was an item I heard on "Costing the Earth", the BBC Radio 4 programme that looks at environmental issues. Now my approach to environmentalism is like everything I do, very pragmatic. I can't see how there is any sense in trying to get people to voluntarily change their behaviour if the consequences of that change is:-

a) Too far removed from the timeline of their conscious existence. That is, most people believe that the impact of their behaviour is way beyond their life span and unfortunately they don't hold the same values about generational responsibility as the Native Americans. I have heard it said that traditionally some Native Americans took the view that they should never do anything without considering the consequences on seven future generations. Put simply; it won't be their problem so they just don't care. And

b) The type of shift in behaviour is so great that people can't conceive how they would function if they had to give up or drastically reduce their environmentally damaging behaviour. For example we have become so used to the car that asking people to stop driving now that our lives are based around them is like asking people to give up mobile phones. Yes we can live without them but why should we. In my view cars are not the problem; the problem is that they use fossil fuel that has a greenhouse effect. So rather than expecting people to cut down on car journeys, wouldn't it be easier to make non-polluting cars compulsory.

Costing the Earth was looking at the arguments for and against pylons versus underground cabling. Apparently pylons are ugly and spoil the appearance of the traditional British landscape. I was shocked to learn that pylons are ugly. I have always quite liked them and I've never seen them as an intrusion on the landscape. I can remember being totally mesmerised by pylons as a child. To me they looked like a space army of giants marching across the planes. And in my imagination they were friendly, their outstretched arms protecting us from the hostile invading armies of aliens.

If I was naturally biased towards pylons; what clinched it for me was the revelation that it costs between 3 and 18 times more money to lay underground cables than it does to put up pylons. 1 mile of electric cable carried by pylons cost roughly £1.5 million. Conversely underground cabling can cost around £18 million per mile. Guess who gets to pay for it. Yes you and me through our fuel bills. I'm sorry, but electricity is already at a price point where I am seriously contemplating kerosene storm lanterns to light my house; so there's no way I want to pay 18 times more than I have to just to keep someone in the countryside's view of fields and trees “unspoilt”.

So much for the big society! Shouldn't the people in the countryside sacrifice their views for the good of the nation? If they aren't prepared to do that then I'm sure they could volunteer to cover the difference in cost through a local levy. That seems like a win-win situation to me. Perhaps I’ll send a link to my blog to OFGEM!

What are your thoughts on pylons – works of art or eyesores? Please share your views; I look forward to reading them.

The secret to healing our relationship with money

2011-10-18T23:47:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I blogged about pebble dashing buildings and how some people do a similar thing to different aspects of their lives – in particular their finances. We think of money as something that in itself has value; however money is just a medium of exchange. It has no value or energy unless we give it to it by virtue of our beliefs and attitudes to it. Even when currencies were backed by a gold standard, it was a matter of trust that you would be able to present the piece of paper to the bank and they would exchange it for an equivalent amount of gold. Now that money really isn't worth the paper it is printed on, we experience a collective confusion about its power over us and while we desire it so much.

Throughout history money has come and gone. You might be surprised to learn that after the fall of the Roman Empire in the fourth century C.E. money all but disappeared from Western Europe for nearly 1000 years. Our history with money is so littered with examples of rulers seeking to possess it at all costs and the collateral damage caused by their excessive greed; the collective human psyche now bears the scars. According to Carl Jung’s theory of analytical psychology, the entire human experience is shared in the collective unconscious and is manifest in our lives through archetypes. Jung believed that the archetypes were inherited unconscious patterns of thought which affect our actions, motives and behaviours. Therefore, our relationship with money is made up of all of our individual experiences of money throughout history.

Perhaps you find this difficult to believe, that's fine, it's just a theory to explain what we experience. Even if you aren't a follower of Jung, your own experience will tell you that your feelings and attitudes towards money run far deeper than what you have individually experienced in your own life.

Although we aren't able to rewrite history, we are limitless in our ability and power to write the future. We have the ability to expand our conscious awareness and from that new awareness to remodel the reality we experience.

If we are to individually and collectively heal our relationship with money we need to first except that something needs to change and then develop a better understanding of our collective history and experience with money.

I will go into more detail about the history of money in a future blog post. In the meantime you may wish to commence this journey into expanded awareness by pondering the following question.

What if you were to describe your relationship with money as if you were telling someone about your relationship with a close friend or partner: what would you say?

Please share your thoughts, I love to read them.

What lies beneath

2011-10-17T23:42:00.004+01:00

The other day I was on my way back from town. Lately I've been hopping on the bus to and from the station mainly because my less than practical business smart shoes are a killer to walk in. I know I couldn't possibly manage the three quarters of a mile journey which includes a very steep hill. Well at least that's what I tell myself. 50% of the time it's true and the other 50% I just can't be bothered to walk. This is a real turnabout for me; the person who used to cycle a 12 mile round trip to and from work daily. And there were days when I'd clocked up over 30 miles if I had meetings to go to. On more than one occasion I even cycled from the Elephant and Castle to Hampstead and from there to my home in south-east London, a cool 40 mile round trip. Consequently, noticing that I had become so sedentary that walking home felt like an effort, set alarm bells ringing.

Anyway, this day I didn't have the inappropriate shoes excuse. Despite the fact that I could have fallen back on the fact that it was about to rain (it was), I decided to get on with it and walk. Walking although obviously slower than riding the bus; has the advantage of providing a completely different perspective of your environment. Being slower you notice so much more. I noticed that the town centre looks like it is well on the way down. You can always tell because more and more shop fronts are given over to open plan retailers who operate from the pile them high market stall mentality. If that doesn't clinch it, the nail in the coffin is the influx of bargain basement shops selling everything for less than 99p. Leaving all that aside, the most amazing thing was I walked past a builder who was pebble dashing a boundary wall. Pebble dashing – surely this ugliest of fascia treatments; second only to stone cladding, is not making a comeback? Call me a snob but pebble dashing a building is no longer stylish. It is even difficult to believe it may have been once; then again so was Formica. However tastes change and it definitely isn't in fashion today.

It set me wondering what possible reason the owner had for doing this. The original motivation for pebble dashing a building was to hide imperfections. To put on a thin veneer of respectability, when just below the surface lay cracks and other faults. As I pondered this, it occurred to me that people sometimes pebble dash aspects of their lives. For example I can think of a few people who've pebble dashed their finances. That is they've put on a good veneer to cover up the cracks. Either spending like there's no tomorrow, wholly unaware of whether their cash flow is enough to meet their outgoings. Or constantly worrying about how they are going o make ends meet. However hiding what's wrong is never the solution.

The good news is that taking off pebble dash is actually possible. It's by no means an easy job and there is a lot of work required to repair both the original faults and the damage caused by removing the cladding. Once it is off and the work to repair what lies beneath is completed, the beauty of the building really shines through. It's clear that the improvements are even better than the original.

If you're one of the people who has pebble dashed their finances, a good place to start hacking away the cladding is by looking at the quality of the relationship you have with money. Many people have difficulty with their finances because their beliefs and attitudes towards money are out of alignment. In tomorrow's post I will be looking at why this is, so stay tuned.

What have you notice when you have slowed down to appreciate your environment. Please share your observations I look forward to reading them.

A message from the universe

2011-10-16T23:51:00.003+01:00

Once a month I hold and interfaith spiritual gathering in the local Unitarian Church. The Unitarians are really open to the idea of interfaith; hence the loan of their building once a month. However, I rarely, if ever attract any of their regular congregation to my services. That is except for Harold (not his real name). Harold is in his 80s and I have come to think of him as part of my family over the four years he's been attending. Harold, however, is my heckler. He interrupts me and introduces random snippets of information (actually they are hardly snippets as this would suggest that he keeps them short and to the point and they are as far away from being this as the sun is from the next star in our solar system). In his day, Harold was a jazz musician; playing the piano at Ronnie Scott's with other big names. Now he lives alone with no family to speak of; which is why I believe he attends. We are his family when the Unitarians aren't there.

Apart from Harold, my service has a small following. The usual attendees consist of my husband and sons; who come because I make them - because they “luuuv” me. I know it is far too early for them to be up at the weekend so I really appreciate their sacrifice. My mother, who is always late as she has to attend a proper service at the local Church of England before coming to support me. My brother and his family also used to attend before he moved overseas and I have a couple of other regulars who whilst do not attend every single month do show up with frequent regularity.

Every so often I become consumed with the futility of it all. Initially I had dreams of large numbers of Believers not Belongers; people who believe in a spiritual connection and want to express it but do not belong to a particular tradition. The most people I have ever had at a gathering is 20. Lately my numbers have been declining. That is if you can decline from such a low base. This month was one of those months and I was busy telling myself that this week would be the last one. I should have known better because every time I get to this point; something happens to convince me to continue. The universe definitely knows how to drop hints.

Today’s gathering was particularly devoid of attendees. 90% of the regulars were either away on holiday, had opted to enjoy the late autumnal is sunshine or had chosen to stay in bed. The service starts at 11 o'clock and at 11:05 I was sitting there waiting with my husband and one son (the other one falling into the away on holiday category). I was just about to pack up and go when the door opened and in came five people. Now these five people have been to a few of my services before. They were the residents and two of the carers of a nearby home for brain injured individuals.

The residents all have significant disabilities in terms of mobility and speech. I normally begin my services by asking people to participate in an opening practice designed to leave the outside world outside and bring everybody's focus into the room. The one I had planned involve people moving around, but because I knew this would cause difficulty to the three residents from the home; I decided that we would simply go round the group, each person saying two things. People were to say there name and one thing that there were truly joyful about.

The residents from the home all shared how happy they were to either be alive; to enjoy the autumn sunshine or to live in a community where they were fully supported. I was really touched that these people, whom from the outside looking in, appear to have nothing to be joyful about were able to find positive things to say. The really incredible thing was that when it came to the turn of my 12-year-old son to share one thing that he was grateful for he said he couldn't think of a single thing. This was despite my cajoling him and suggesting things that he could put forward.

Now I appreciate that this could have been because he felt shy, however, knowing my son as I do, I'm pretty sure that this was not the reason. It got me thinking just how much we take for granted. How often do we dismiss things like good health, living in a peaceful society, having fresh water on tap etc.

After the service one of the carers came up to me and said how much she had really enjoyed the service and that she knew the three residents also really enjoyed it because they are always so eager to attend. I was touched and bam ... There was my reason not to give up my monthly interfaith spiritual gathering!

How do you ensure that you do not take the blessings in your life for granted? Please share your thoughts I love to read them.

Money Rapport

2011-10-15T23:50:00.000+01:00

Everybody wants money and lots of it, even if their definition of lots is enough money to live debt free and take two family holidays per year. As a nation we have created many get rich quick strategies. The national lottery and the Euro millions are possibly the most notorious examples. Many of us all dream, even if we don't play, of how we would share and spent the four-time rollover jackpot of silly money, typically in the hundreds of millions. Then we have the shortcut to fame and riches strategies deployed by the media industry. These convince us that if only we could be noticed for a microsecond we would have access to limitless opportunities to make money. No one in the West can live without money. Indeed there very few societies in the world today where one can live without money -those that exist are typically either religious communes or small tribes in uncharted forests where it possible to exist as a subsistence farmer or hunter gatherers.

We all want money yet we all “hate” money. Money seems to be the root of all evil and so outwardly we display love for it and inwardly we feel shame and anxiety and even fear because of the control it has over us. In the West we know that without money we would quickly slide into poverty and state dependence. A life of living hand to mouth at the mercy of government programs and policies designed to give you barely enough. The unfortunates who find themselves in this position are forced to hustle for spare pennies and/or engage in illegal activities in order to have access to what they see other members of the pack enjoying. The workhouse attitude (i.e. an intolerance of those who taking handouts from the state) still remains and being supported by the state is still seen by many as being the lowest of the low irrespective of how they came to be in that situation. The state- dependent are continually derided by the tabloid press for daring to make the best of a terrible situation. Sadly those on the other side of the equation often join the condemnation. Perhaps this is out of fear or shame that we have not been able to create a fairer community, one without the huge disparities in financial resources despite the technological advances of the 21st-century.

Money plays such a significant part in our lives that we measure our potential for greatness according to the amount of money we have access to. Not only that rather than living the life we desire we only fantasize about it in our dreams, longing for all the great things we could accomplish if we only had money. As a result many people put their lives on hold because they don't have the money to live the life of their imagination.

We are taught to believe that money is limited and scarce and therefore we developed a schizophrenic relationship with it. In other words we have internalised a sense of grasping; that is feeling that you have to take what you need for yourself from another in order to have enough rather than believing, as it is true, that there is more than enough wealth for everybody to have more than enough.

Becoming wealthy starts with the heart, although we often think that it starts with constructing strategies by which to make money. Wealth starts in the heart because this is the part of the soul that we identify with passion, connection and love. Creating wealth in the mind without the heart connection creates wealth that is predominantly external. Such wealth, history has shown, benefits a small minority at the expense of the majority. However, wealth created in the heart seeks to be good for the many. It transfers not only value but also compassion, understanding and love. This wealth engenders a real sense of doing good for all; doing no harm and serving not only the wealth creators but others too at a deeper spiritual level. Wealth created in the heart begins by healing our relationship to money so that we truly understand the extent as well of the limits of its power over us to determine our future.

What is your relationship to money and do you believe that money and wealth are the same thing? Please share your views I look forward to reading them.

If you tolerate this your children will be next

2011-10-14T21:01:00.000+01:00

I think I'm in rant mode today. Not only has it been ages since I've had a rant; but there's so much to rant about today!

Finally Dr Liam Fox resigns! Durh: come on – it took him eight days to work out that taking your best mate to work and giving him privileged access to your employer’s information was possibly the stupidest thing anyone could ever do. Okay, maybe you could get away with it once on “bring your mate to work day” (similar to “bring your daughter to work day” but I don't think that they’ve been invented yet); but every day! Can you imagine if you worked for Apple or Barclays ...or anyone really; turning up to work every day with your mate; allowing them to sit in your meetings; letting them have access to company information (even if you didn't give them express consent, clearly they would have access to everything that you left and secured on your desk or your PC). How long do you think you'd be able to get away with that? Perhaps one day, maybe two. I'm pretty sure your senior manager would call you into their office and asked you what the hell you thought you were doing and promptly sack you. Oh but Dr Fox's senior manager is David Cameron and perhaps he didn’t think that there was anything wrong with it either. Are they really asking us to believe that for the last 18 months the Tories were unaware that this is what was happening? I am surprised that it took the Labour Party so long to bring it to our attention.

Moving on: Wow things have gotten rough in the UK! If you never quite believed that ordinary people do not matter to those in power with money and influence; what could say it even more clearly than the treatment offered to the most senior members of our community when they are at their most vulnerable. Moreover our obsession with remaining young really only ever had one outcome; if I recall they made a film about it. It was called Logan’s run. We may not quite be there yet, but as the song says “if you tolerate this your children will be next”.

Elders of the community used to be respected and valued for their wisdom because we recognised that having lived longer they had experienced more and therefore knew more. Now that you can experience a lifetime of knowledge at the click of a button by asking Google; we have erroneously convinced ourselves that elders have nothing of value to offer. Of course not all elders are wise and all of us, I'm sure, can think of cantankerous unfriendly old people who we would rather not engage with. However, I was taught to respect those older than me. Even if these days the younger generations think that they know it all; do we not owe our parents the same love, care and compassion that they offered us when we were unable to provide it for ourselves.

The treatment of elders in the NHS is primarily the result of the lack of resources that is put into this part of the service. It takes a lot of love and compassion to wipe up human excrement, to feed and bath someone who may be abusive and unappreciative due to dementia. It takes a lot of love and compassion to be kind and caring when you are stressed out of your mind due to the pressures of your own life and this is compounded by being overworked underpaid and undervalued. Is it any wonder that many nurses operate as if they are totally disconnected from the human being at the end of the service they deliver?

And on the street tonight an old man plays
With newspaper cuttings of his glory days

And if you tolerate this
Then your children will be next
And if you tolerate this
Then your children will be next
Will be next
Will be next
Will be next

Manic street preachers: If you tolerate this your children will be next.

What would you rant about today? Please share your views I look forward to reading them.

Full of cheer

2011-10-13T23:58:00.000+01:00

Today I'm lost for words. I think it's because I have a cold and every time I start to write I have to stop to wipe my nose. I have the sort of cold I hate the most: you know the one with the constantly running nose, which manages to feel completely bunged up at the same time as it's running. I don't get that. How can your nose be running all the time and still be blocked? Anyway I'm starting to feel quite sorry for myself, so I've decided not to write much more than this. Rather than writing I'm going to post some “cheer me up” videos, courtesy of YouTube. You Tube is great for cheering one up. There are so many wacky and funny things on it. Normally I tell myself I'm far too busy to waste time watching pointless videos, however, when you have got a cold none of the usual rules count. At least not in my book.

Hopefully I'll feel better by morning – actually I hope I sound better by the morning as I am giving a presentation at my breakfast networking meeting.”Nallow my dame is Dolar and dye douing do dalk do you adout now do dook dood daked” doesn't quite cut it!

Dissed by my cat...

2011-10-12T22:49:00.000+01:00

Today I was "dissed" as they used to say, by my sons and my cat! Sometime after the word "diss" was in circulation, I learned that "dissed" was shorthand for disrespected. However this is not really what I mean; my sons are lovely and they wouldn't disrespect me in that sense. It's more like an embarrassment factor.

I mentioned yesterday that both boys were off on school journey today at different times. In addition I had to be at the radio station www.playvybz.com to host my radio show Tycoon Women Moments at precisely the same time that my older son’s coach was leaving.

I decided that I would leave it to his BFF’s (best friends forever – not sure if that is a guy thing or only girls use it) mother to wave goodbye to his coach. My solution: I would kill two birds with one stone and drop both of them to school in the morning (I had to take the younger one’s suitcase to school for him anyway). I would then return to wave goodbye to the coach and pickup my older son who needed to come back home pickup his own suitcase and get changed. The final part of the strategy would be to bring my older son and his suitcase back at about 2 PM and drop them off at his BFF’s house (which is conveniently behind the school).

Diss 1: I arrived at the school with both sons as planned and the oldest one gets out of the car without even a word of thanks or goodbye. When I called him back to ask why he had not seen the need to say either thank you for the lift or goodbye, he said “why do I need to say goodbye I'm seeing you again later”. “What about thank you” I said; his reply – “people are watching!”

Diss 2: as planned I returned to the school at 11 AM and waited 30 min in the cold whilst my younger son had an early lunch in the warm. When he came out to board the coach he looked astonished that I had returned. “I've come to say goodbye” I said “again” replied my son. "No hug then” I said "Everyone is watching!" He said in horror "Well how about a peck on the cheek" I said – "Gosh mum no way "is the censored version of the interpretation of the look he gave me! Needless to say I left without waving goodbye to a pulling-away-from-the-curb coach.

Diss 3: crazy, senile cat. This evening I arrived home after my radio show to see my cat waiting patiently outside the house, to be let in. I did think it was strange as the lights were on, however I didn't give it a second thought. My cat jumped off the stoop and climbed onto the bonnet of my car and then proceeded to look at me lovingly through the windscreen; making that direct eye contact cats do when they want to intimidate you. I had to make a phone call so it was sometime before I eventually got out of the car. My cat waited patiently, all the time given me long loving looks and after a while decided to curl up on the warm bonnet and take a nap.

As I opened the front door I called to the cat to come inside but she refused to budge. I spent 5 min trying to coax my cat to come into the warm before I gave up and went inside. By the time I got to the kitchen at the back of the house, my cat was already there waiting on the cold side of the kitchen window looking sorrowfully in ,as if no one had ever fed her or let her into the house before! I'm convinced she is trying to get us prosecuted by the RSPCA for neglect!

They say never work with animals or children; I say don't hold your breath if you expect animals or children to appreciate what you do for them.

Do you have teenaged children who are embarrassed by your public displays of affection? Please share your stories I'd love to read about them.

Learning the beauty of flow versus the hammer

2011-10-11T23:12:00.000+01:00

Today was a day when I learned the beauty of flow versus the hammer. Sometimes in life obstacles get in the way of our progress and we have to choose whether to use a hammer to smash them out of the way or allow the natural flow of life to approach it like a river. Water often encounters obstacles, however, rather than hitting against them like a hammer, it flows over and around creating new pathways and continuing on its way. Eventually the effects of erosion will eliminate the obstacle completely. However, until that time the size and mass of the obstacle is incorporated into the flow of the river creating new and varied currents before and after it, but flowing just the same.

The wisdom of life is knowing when to use the hammer to smash an obstacle out of the way, i.e. using brute force against the object. There is no finesse or elegance to the use of this type of force, yet sometimes this is just what is required. If you choose to flow around what is in your way, it is in recognition that the energy required to smash against it will be better used to incorporate it into your flow and continue on your way. Hammers require you to stand still and battle, whereas the natural flow of water facilitates movement towards your goals.

So how did I come by this wisdom? I got upset with my computer which had yet again froze a.k.a. stopped responding and shut down the program without saving my work. Now I know what you're thinking -didn't I learn my lesson from the last time this happened – yes I did that is why I had set the computer to auto save every 2 minutes. Unfortunately when I opened the program again there was no recovery document and the last saved version had lost the whole afternoon's work! That was the obstacle. My hammer was to throw a hissy fit and sling my headset violently across the room. Now it had never been the most robust of headsets, indeed it had come apart several times at the slightest knock. Consequently throwing it like Thor’s (the God of Thunder) hammer were like etching the final words being on its epitaph!

The result: I had no work and no headset. My very loving husband heard the commotion and came up to give me a "never mind dear" hug. It didn't really do that much to calm me down, but I did appreciate the gesture enough to decide to try my final “get out of jail” move to recover my work, i.e. shut the program down again and re open it. And it worked! – a recovered version of my document auto saved by the computer. I was back in flow. Had I tried to find a way around the obstacle in the first place rather than hitting it literally with a hammer, I could have saved myself the £24.99 it cost me to replace my headset. Looking on the bright side; the new headset is 100 times better than the old one so I guess it wasn't a total loss.

What strategies do you use to determine whether to use your hammer or your flow when you encounter obstacles in your path? Please share your experiences so others can benefit. I really enjoy reading them.

School camp

2011-10-10T23:53:00.002+01:00

My boys (that sounds like I’m Ma Baker!) are both going on school trips this week. The eldest to South Africa and the younger boy: a two-day trip to Kent! As my older son is going half way around the world for two weeks; you'd imagine that if either of the two were fretting about being away from home (a.k.a. mummy), it would be the one with the longest journey and the greatest period of absence. Not so – Admittedly it was unlikely as my older son is almost 17 and I would imagine that it would be pretty un cool for a teenager to express a desire to stay at home. However it didn't cross my mind that the “baby” of the family would want to hold tight to my apron strings. He's normally so independent and self assured.

Today he declared that he did not want to go and would it be possible for me to cancel the £200 no refunds trip he's scheduled to attend. Obviously the answer was” no I don't think so”. Whilst it was clearly not negotiable, I decided I ought to show some empathy. I asked him why he would want to be the only child in his year group who hadn't gone. His body language told me that the situation called for some mummy coaching attention. Apparently the reason he wanted to stay at home was that he was not very attracted to the idea of having to sleep in a room with strangers that he did not like and were bound to upset him with their juvenile antics. (I can't imagine where he gets his condescending intolerance from.)Moreover he had been told that it was a team building exercise and he hated team work

When put like that, I could see that he had a point, not a strong enough one to keep him at home but a point nonetheless. My son had chosen to focus on the negative aspects of his trip rather than the opportunities that it could provide. Clearly he's not alone in this behaviour. It's a commonly deployed strategy of those who are afraid or who are facing unfamiliar circumstances. Finding reasons to hide behind our fears can be attractive in the short term because we delude ourselves into believing that things don’t have to change. However life is continuous change and unfortunately some changes are scary. The trick is to know that even if you feel afraid, fear is still only a feeling. All feelings just want to be acknowledged and felt and fear is no different.

The old maxim: “feel the fear and do it anyway” can seem quite glib if you are terrified, but it is actually what is called for. Acknowledging that you are afraid, that you do not want change and you want to be wrapped up in cotton wool is okay if you can get to a space where you understand that feeling this way does not have to prevent you from taking action.

So I let my son know that it was okay for him to not want to go and to be anxious about being away from home. We sat and talked and I gave him a cuddle as he experienced feeling afraid. Afterwards we talked about what he could look forward to on the trip and what he could do if he felt overwhelmed whilst he was away. He seemed much happier and then typical of all children he realised that his favourite programme was about to start, lost interest and went off to watch it! Well at least he looked happier.

Grandma knows best - the secret to surviving other peoples' winter colds

2011-10-09T23:52:00.001+01:00

It's 11:30 PM on Sunday and the end of a fun filled weekend. It was last of the autumn birthday parties in my household. Every family seems to have one of those expensive periods during the year when there is a convergence of birthdays. My family’s is September/October. Between 2 September – 4 October there are seven birthdays; nine if you count the birthdays of the now departed family members. This has meant some for or birthday celebration each weekend for the last for weeks and I'm glad it's finally over.

As I sit here and write my blog, my concentration is periodically broken by the hacking sounds of my youngest son coughing and sneezing. Yep cold season is back!

The worst thing about a child with a cold is the constant begging for medicine. They don't seem to get that the words "do not exceed stated dose" apply everyone and they aren't exempt because they are sick and therefore need medicine on tap. Unfortunately, most cough syrups work for about an hour before they wear off and if you have a troublesome cough that is causing your whole body to ache due to the strain on your abdominal muscles, then what you really want is relief not an annoying mum telling you that you cannot have any more medicine.

Enter grandma with the solution; a recipe for an effective cough syrup that you can drink to your heart’s content and that works just as well as the store bought varieties. It's based on onions and is very easy to make. Therefore in case you need it for yourself or a troublesome male with a cold (yes male, women are far more stoic when it comes to dealing with a cold) the instructions are below.

You will need:

1 onion (large)

Sugar (six tablespoons)

A small container with a lid (jam jars are really good)

Method:

Peel and slice up the onion thinly – you can dice it if you prefer. Put a layer of chopped onion into your container and cover it with sugar (about a tablespoon full). Repeat this process, alternating layers of onions and sugar until the onions and sugar are all used up. Put the lid on the container and store it in the fridge. Leave for 4 – 6 hours or overnight. The onions will seep and produced a clear sweet syrup.

To use: take a desert spoonful of the syrup to ease your coughing as required. The onions should continue to produce syrup for a few days (3 – 5 days depending on how often you take the syrup). When no more syrup is produced discard the onions and start again.

Hope it helps

Do you have any home remedies? Please share, I'd love to read about them.

NB : this is a home remedy for a cough syrup and is not meant to replace professional medical advice. If you are worried about your health or if you have cold symptoms that persist for more than a few days then seek professional advice from your medical practitioner.

image by Sick Man by David Castillo Dominici

True forgiveness heals

2011-10-08T23:55:00.010+01:00

Holding a grudge is like giving somebody permission to live inside your head rent-free. Also it is very easy to use the betrayals, injustices, abuse, abandonment and hurts committed against you as the justification for everything else that is wrong in your life. Often when we find ourselves stuck it is easy to retreat behind blame and see ourselves as victims which prevents us from moving forward. Restarting smart and really taking up the opportunity of a second chance starts with embracing forgiveness, i.e. looking inwards and taking complete responsibility for your experiences without blaming or condemning yourself or others. Forgiveness is the gateway to loving and accepting your true self, the You that you were created to be.

It's a common mistake to believe that in order to forgive someone or even yourself requires you to take some kind of dramatic action on your part and/or the surrendering of your beliefs and values. In actual fact forgiveness is effortless because it is an act of opening and trusting that the universe will bring what is required for you to heal. Perhaps it is because of our great advancements that we believe that we are instrumental in all processes and nothing can happen without our deliberate intervention. However, the universe runs perfectly well without us and brings forgiveness where it is needed. The only part we have to play is to provide the right conditions, i.e. to be open to the magic...

Last year I decided I would grow lots of vegetables in my garden. Now I have to tell you something about my garden in order for you to understand what a monumental decision this was. My garden is a lazy person's dream! If you are the sort of gardener who wants all the fringe benefits of a garden, i.e, somewhere pleasant to sit out when the sun is shining, an extra room to escape to win your house seems more full than usual or the perfect place to burn food on a sunny day without setting the rest of the house on fire a.k.a. a barbecue; then my garden is for you. It requires little or no maintenance. I have slow-growing grass (which means I can get away with cutting it once a month even if it rains a lot. For the non gardeners reading this: the more it rains the faster your grass grows); borders that are full of shrubs and covered with decorative slate to suppress the weeds and large areas of decking and paved patio. The upside is that I don't have to do much gardening. The downside; I have very little soil plant things in. As I had decided to grow crops I had to get lots of planters which I put on my patio and on the decking. To maximise the growing space available I decided to "go up" and so I also purchased a number of hanging planters so that I could cultivate the available airspace too.

Having laid out the ground I duly sowed my crops and gave them lots of care and attention and as a consequence in the autumn I harvest a reasonably sized bounty – not quite enough to supply the local farmers market, but I was happy. This year I returned to type and decided to go with the lazy gardener persona and the minimalist approach, i.e. leave it to nature and mow the lawn infrequently. To my surprise, I noticed a tomato plant growing in a pot. I hadn't planted it there, indeed I had planted anything anywhere! What had happened was nature had stepped in. the tomate had self seeded from one of the hanging planters immediately above the pot, which last year grew small cherry tomatoes.

Whlist most people would have been elated; the lazy gardener in me only saw more hard work. "Well", I thought "I didn't plant it so I'm not going to look after it!" I didn't do anything at all to the maveric tomatoe plant.. My husband, who takes pity on all the container plants because they don't have access to hidden supplies of water deep underground, included the unplanned offspring in his daily watering cycle. Apart from this, the tomatoe was left to its own devices. Despite my lack of interest the tomato plant grew and produced a healthy crop of cherry tomatoes. It had all it needed: water, soil and the intention to grow.

Forgiveness is like this. As I said earlier it is a common misconception that in order to forgive you have to do something elaborate, or make a big gesture, like I had done the previous year with my crops. When actually all that is required is the seed of the intention to forgive and the soil, i.e. the openness to the idea of forgiveness, held within your being. (I could say your heart but I find that it is a whole-body process. The heart has long been used as a metaphor for the centre of our being, however, more and more evidence is emerging to demonstrate that our thoughts and feelings are whole-body processes rather than being located in either our heads or our “hearts“).

Once you open to the idea that forgivenesss is a process and you plant the intention;the universe, like nature, simply allows it to grow. Imagine that your forgiveness is a tiny seed that you have planted in a pot of soil. Each day you water it and nothing happens there is no movement, no noticeable change yet beneath the earth there is activity. Then suddenly without any help, two tiny leaves appear breaking through the soil.

Please leave your comments. I love to read about your thoughts.

A monent in the day of a busy Tycoon woman

2011-10-07T22:17:00.000+01:00

The games adults play

2011-10-06T23:38:00.000+01:00

I have just come back from tae kwon do and as always my whole body hurts! However, this time I was the victim of optimism beyond reason. Our instructor had the "brilliant" (I used the word in irony) idea of getting the class to play leapfrog – yes leapfrog - to increase our agility. Now I may look two thirds of my age (or even half it on a particularly good day), but I am really 50. What I know from my past career as an exercise professional, is that older people are less flexible, take longer to warm up and are slower to heal!

I knew from the moment he said the word “leapfrog” that it would all end in tears. Apart from the fact that even as a child I wasn't particularly good at leapfrog. (Indeed the prevailing memory I have of playing it is misjudging the height of a bollard I was leapfrogging over and colliding pelvic bone to immovable concrete object – you do the physics. It was not a pleasant experience). Most of my class mates are males over 5’10” so I didn’t relish the thought of having to support their weight on my back.

Anyway I decided not to be a whoosh and reluctantly joined in. It’s true what they say about abstinence improving your performance because despite the many years break, I was actually not that bad at it. So where were the tears? From one of my classmates; a particularly weighty and sometimes stroppy 13-year-old, who repeated my experience with the bollard only this time I was the bollard!

Falling over is bad enough when you are 50 and possibly the only thing that could make it any worse is a heavy teenager, who is in the act of propelling themselves forward, falling on top of you. Hence the pain and the twisted joints! Oh well at least it provided me with something to blog about – I'm desperately looking for the positive! OK, if I’m honest, it was actually quite fun.

What was your favourite game when you were a child and do you still play it? Please share your stories, are always look forward to reading them.

No better than best

2011-10-05T21:33:00.000+01:00

Today I presented a workshop at the city business library in central London, entitled how to become a tycoon woman. The feedback I got was really positive and empowering. One very nice woman even told me that she often attends workshops and finds herself thinking “gosh that delivery was terrible! I don't ever want to be like that” BUT today she thought “that's just how I want to be when I deliver my workshops.” She's aspiring to be me! Wow how fantastic. The strange thing is that I was thinking: I talk to fast; the information was insufficient and maybe my audience did not get what they paid for – well came for, because it was free.

Isn't it bizarre that the most critical eyes of all are our very own? No eyes see as many faults or pick as many holes or ignore as many successes as the pair of eyes stuck to the front of our own heads. Why is that? I think it is because we are fed a constant diet of other people's expectations. We feast on them hungrily and then we are surprised when we find that we don't measure up to them. Why would we? – They were never our dreams or our desires and we didn't construct the measuring stick. The only standard you ever have to meet is the one of I tried my hardest/I did my best because your best will always be good enough – because it is your best.

Clearly your best will change depending on the circumstances. On Darth Vader days, your best is going to be a lot different from what it is on the days when you are in complete flow with the universe. However, if you always do your best then that's all that is required. Knowing that you have no standard to meet other than your internal intention of doing your best allows you to take off the baggage of not-good-enough which saps our confidence and stops us achieving or even striving for our dreams.

Whenever you feel like you are not-good-enough ask yourself "did I do my best in this moment?" And if the answer is yes; say to the voice in your head “Be quiet! This is my best and my best is what is required”. If on the other hand the answer is no because you didn't try your hardest – forgive yourself and either go back and do your best if that's possible or set your intention to do so next time.

True success is built on confidence and confidence comes from being yourself rather than someone else's notion of you.

What do you do to turn down the voices in your head? Please share your strategies and comments I look forward to reading them.

10:10:10 Blogging - how to keep it short and sweet!

2011-10-04T19:39:00.000+01:00

It normally takes me about three hours to write edit and post my blog; which if I am going to continue to do it on a daily basis really isn't going to “fly” long-term. (That’s south London speak for it won't work). Therefore I've decided I need a much faster turnaround – something like 30 minutes. Broken down that would be 15 minutes to write, 10 minutes to edit and 5 minutes to post. Posting it takes a while because Firefox can be a real brute 90% of the time; hanging, freezing and crashing. On reflection I should allow 10 minutes to post. Okay that works out as 10, 10, 10 – short and sweet and to the point. Consequently my new challenge is what meaningful, interesting and inspiring thoughts I can convey in 10 min. Here's today's:

I had a great day. Everything that went wrong turned out to have a silver lining behind the grey clouds. I drove the wrong way, got stuck in traffic and had to abandon my breakfast meeting. Then my first appointment stood me up. This meant that I was left with time on my hands which I used to get some other things done that I've been putting off for a while. I also took the opportunity to connect with two fabulous people and they in turn offered me some phenomenal input to a new idea I’ve been working on.

The message; even when you are not looking for it the universe will support you. There is opportunity in every moment you just have to be open to receive it.

If you would like to read longer posts check out my website www.tycoonwomen.com

I’d love to read your thoughts on my new approach so please leave a comment.

The secret to building a staircase of confidence

2011-10-03T20:37:00.000+01:00

Today I went running for the first time in months. I think the last time I managed to go running was last winter or it could have been spring this year; it gets so confusing now that you can no longer use the temperature or the weather as an indication of what season it is. Not that I'm complaining. It's absolutely fabulous, amazing, and marvellous that we are enjoying some summer sunshine in October. At least when it eventually does get really cold will have this time to look back on with deep affection and summer smiles.

As I was saying I went running today, I just felt like I needed to work out hard. You know how sometimes you want to sweat buckets and get that adrenaline rush; well that's what I was looking for. I miss cycling to work every day and the exhilaration you get when you finish a hard ride into the office. I have been meaning to go running for some time but everyday things get in the way. So today I decided that I would go running come what may! Unfortunately I had other pressing thing which I also needed to get done today (I'd been putting off completing my VAT return all month and although I still have to the end of the week, I knew that if I didn't do it today there was a real possibility of it being late) so I could see the day ending without me getting out for my run.

Looking at the million and one things (ok that’s a slight exaggeration) on my to-do list; I decided to rename it my Tick–When–Done list. Tick – when – done seems much less foreboding. A list with 1,000,001 Tick – When –Done items sounds like a reward system; with every item you clear you get a reward i.e. a tick. Whereas when you have a lengthy list of “to dos” every time you complete something it can feel like there is still more to be done and therefore it seems like a list of burdens. Sometimes the smallest changes make all the difference. I suggest you give it a try and see whether it changes the way you feel about your list of things to do.

The other benefit of having a Tick-When-Done list is the greater sense of achievement you get every time you give yourself a tick. Achievement is possibly the best confidence booster there is. Most people think of achievement in terms of mega challenges. That is they only really feel like they've achieved something if beforehand they were 95% convinced that it couldn’t be done. However, there is nothing preventing you from classifying anything you accomplish as an achievement, even a mega achievement and giving yourself a pat on the back in celebration. Many of us, me included, were raised by loving parents and carers who were taught to believe that too much praise made one big headed and led to the development of an inflated ego. Consequently the very British way is to skimp on the praise and sadly this has been both perpetuated and internalised from generation to generation.

Whilst I'm not absolutely sure of the dynamics of developing an inflated ego, something tells me that it probably has a lot more to do with a deep seated lack of self belief and confidence than being told "well done" when you achieve something. Confidence comes from believing you are valued and what you have done is appreciated. An inflated ego stems from a need to be valued and externally validated. The voice of the ego says "look at me, look at what I've done"; whereas confidence says "I am pleased that I have achieved that. I feel good about myself". The ego looks outside the self, whereas the confidence self looks inward.

Today I proudly ticked off “Submit VAT return “and “go running” and I gave myself a celebratory pat on the back both times. Then rather than being faced with a to-do list with only two items done, and that sinking feeling of gosh there’s still so much to do; what I saw was two proud ticks on my tick-when-done list and I felt like wow what next what else can I tick.

Whilst it’s great to aim high, sometimes it’s our expectations that are the bars of our prison of inaction. See everything you complete, get done or even try as an amazing achievement and moreover give the same level of appreciation to those around you too. In my experience it far easier to build a stair case of confidence to walk up than trying to launch yourself like a rocket.

How do you respond to your achievements? What do you do to celebrate your every day achievements?

Thank you for taking the time to read my blog. I really appreciate it. I welcome your feedback and comments.

Confidence the real X-Factor

2011-10-02T23:52:00.000+01:00

The X-Factor is back! I managed to miss the majority of the heats and the "judges’ houses", however, I did see the selection. The selection, for those of you not depleting your brain cells with this show, is when each judge tells their final eight hopefuls whether or not they have made it to the live shows. It's a feeding fest! – Like paying your penny to laugh at the lunatics. We can forgive our forefathers for this particular form of entertainment because in those days there really wasn't anything more productive or more interesting to do. We, on the other hand, have access to programs 24/7 and have a wealth of gadgets and gizmos designed to prolong any experience or magic moment. Yet what are a significant number of us going to be doing every Saturday and Sunday for the next 16 weeks? Watching people have their hearts broken and their dream shattered.

I was struck by the number of contestants who said that they wanted to go from being a “nobody” to a “somebody”. These contestants were clearly of the opinion that who they are is what they do and what other people think about them. It is very easy to dismiss all the evidence and come to the conclusion that you are less than, inadequate or not good enough. Such thoughts are fuelled by our negative self talk, the voice living rent free in our heads acting like a judge on the X-Factor, i.e. pulling apart everything we do because it has not measured up to some notional standard.

This brings me to another thing that a lot of the X-Factor hopefuls had in common - a complete lack of self belief or confidence. With the exception of the one crazy wild card cabaret act that Louis Walsh always puts in to stir up controversy and so boots viewing figures, all the contestants had amazing voices; yet to hear them talk about being no bodies and getting through to the live finals being the only chance they have of making anything with their lives you’d never of guest it.

When you don’t believe in yourself you transmit this message to others who then reflect it back to you. The lack of confidence and self belief was cited by some of the judges as the reason they weren’t prepared to back some of the singers. Clearly it is difficult to remain positive and confident when you are under immense pressure. So if it is vital that you project confidence and you don’t feel that way at the time, is there anything you can do about it?

Yes, it begins by acknowledging your feelings, recognising that all feelings want to do is be felt because they are trying to tell you something important; and moving beyond the nervousness to create new positive thoughts.

Your confidence levels are influenced by your fear of failing – the greater the fear the less confident you feel; consequently, realising that failure or being wrong will not kill you can be a big boost to your confidence.

“Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong.”
Peter T. Mcintyre

“I quit being afraid when my first venture failed and the sky didn’t fall down.”
Allen H. Neuharth

Obviously no one likes to “fail” or feel like they’ve failed so the trick is to reframe failure. Rather than being something that is bad and makes you feel sick, think of “failure” as something useful and important for the growth of your self confidence and your overall growth as a human being, i.e. feedback. By seeing failure as feedback you:

learn. If things have not gone as you expected, you can ask yourself questions like: What’s awesome about this situation? What can I learn from this situation?
gain experiences you could not get any other way. In an ideal world it would be less traumatic to learn from other people’s mistakes and failures, however, this is not always easy to do. Sometimes you just have to “fail” on your own to learn the lesson and gain an experience no one can relate to you in mere words.
become stronger. Every time you “fail” you become more accustomed to it. You realize more and more that it’s not the end of the world. You can handle things that would have been very hard to handle a few years back. Failing can also a have an exhilarating component because even though you “failed” you at least took a chance. You didn’t just sit on your hands doing nothing. And that took quite a bit of courage and determination.
increase your chances of succeeding. Every time you “fail” you can learn and increase your inner strength. So every “failure” can make you more and more likely to succeed.

Finally, despite what you might tell yourself, remember, the world really doesn’t revolve around you. Generally other people really don’t care that much about what you do because they have their own life, problems and worries and they think that the world revolves around them! They don’t think that much about you and they are not constantly monitoring what you do wrong or when you “fail”.

Your ego maybe disappointed to note this, however it is a very liberating realisation because now you can let go of the worry that everyone is watching you and focus on doing what you do well.

What do you do to boost your confidence? Please share your thoughts I’d love to read about them.

If peace was an infectious virus...

2011-10-01T23:52:00.003+01:00

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if peace was infectious and you could catch if from another person just like a cold. A world pandemic of peace! Imagine what the news reports covering the outbreak of the peace virus would say!

The Daily Globe News

And in breaking news today: Another case of was identified in a small village in Dafur. Early indications suggest that this is an isolated incident. A spokes person from the WHO said – we believe we have caught it in time.

A girl of 7 was found to have the Omega Peace Virus when she failed to hit her older brother back after he brutally beat her for the handful of grain. Her mother said she knew something was wrong by the way she remained motionless all the while looking at him through the eyes of love. Speaking to our reporter she said ‘There was a beautiful stillness about her and I sensed a strange presence about her. It was like walking into the light. Within a few hours I noticed that her brother has started to calm down. He had been extremely violent over the last week fighting everyone for what ever food they had. I was afraid he was going to be taken off by the soldiers to fight. They like the angry children because they have the energy and the anger to kill for them. By evening he has the same look as his sister. I called the WHO worker straight away.’

The WHO have taken the precaution of instructing all governments not to intervene in the conflict in Dafur– not a problem as most have been keeping a safe distance already. A spokes person from the WHO said: We are monitoring the situation closely and expect there to be no further contamination .

Reports of further cases of the Omega Peace Virus are coming in from around the world the Omega Peace Virus has so far proved to be resistant to all types of apathy and indifference previously used to curtail it. The government today indicated that it would be introducing quarantine measures at airports and there will be restrictions on flights leaving countries where the infection has already been identified. The United States has backed a UN resolution by China to issue everyone over the age of 8 with a weapon in an attempt to stem the infection. However it is looking increasingly likely that we are facing a global pandemic. The last pandemic to hit the world in the 19th Century affected 2 thirds of the worlds population. If Omega Peace Virus follows a similar pattern we anticipate that over 6 billion people will succumb to the virus. Other simulations suggested with modern day global travel that 100% infection is a real possibility. There is no cure.

65 million Indonesians at risk if Peace Virus mutates
1 day ago

JAKARTA (AFP) — More than 60 million Indonesians could be infected with the new strain of the Omega Peace Virus if the virus mutates into a form transmissible between humans, an official said today.

Indonesia is the country were there are already large numbers of people infected with the peace virus, with over 1.8 million people known to practice traditional peace meditations within the Buddhist tradition.

Experts fear the virus, which is usually spread from monks and other religious teachers to lay people, could mutate into a form easily transmissible between ordinary people, sparking an unstoppable global pandemic.

"Some 65 million people or 30 percent of the country's population will be infected if a peace virus pandemic strikes Indonesia," Bayu Krisnamurthi, head of the national committee for control of viruses told reporters.

He said the estimated figure was based on the number of fatalities from flu pandemics in the last century.

Krisnamurthi said Indonesia would hold an emergency drill next week on the resort island of Bali as part of preparations for any such outbreak.

"We never know when it (a pandemic) will happen. This kind of drill will enable us to cope with the situation should one day the peace virus mutate into a form that is easily transmitted between humans," he added.

The drill will involve about 1,000 people and Indonesia "will be the first country in the world that tests its pandemic preparedness plan in full scale," said Krisnamurthi.

How the Omega Peace Virus affects you

The Omega Peace Virus is know as a metamorphic virus because it completely changes the nature of the infected person. Victims show a complete lack of violent tendencies and an inability to perform selfish acts. In extreme cases victims turn the other cheek, remain peaceful even under the threat of death and have been know to give away all their possessions to others

Everyday special days

2011-09-30T23:36:00.000+01:00

It's my youngest son's birthday in four days time. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on which way you choose to look at it; he is still at that age when birthdays and Christmas are so exciting that you can't breathe let alone sleep for at least 10 days beforehand. Consequently, for the last eight days every other sentence out of his mouth has had something to do with his birthday. How many days away it is; whether he can stay up until midnight and open his presents; does he have to go to school?; Does he have to go to tae kwon do?; Who can come to his party? And so on and so on.

Worst still, he has been calculating with Bob Cratchit precision the amount of money he is likely to get in lieu of presents – and spending it! He's even tried to get me to pre-order items based on his expectations of his future gift money; his very own futures market. However I'm no fool; toxic debt is toxic debt even if it is your son’s.

Funny how we think our children aren't paying attention to what we do. My 11, soon-to-be 12-year-old son has already mastered the concept of selling something that you don't have; based on a value you can only guess at, to someone silly enough to be taken in by the idea that "thin air" has value! My mother always says that children are far better at picking up bad examples than adopting good ones. This seems to be a case in point.

I'm not sure just how much more of it I can put up with. I'm sure it's going to get worse as the days countdown from 4 to 0. When I mentioned this to my son, i.e. that all he has done for the last week is bug me constantly about his birthday; he said without missing a beat "but I went to school"!

Looking at it positively, it's nice to know that he is still excited about his special day. Wouldn't it be great if we could be full of the same excitement and anticipation for every single day? What would need to happen for you to look forward positively to every single day? To me the answer is simple, as simple as setting your mind on it. When you wake up decide what sort of day you want and order it up. You do this subconsciously anyway.

Have you noticed how if you wake up feeling terrible and expect the day to go badly it does? And if you wake up feeling on top of the world you end up having a marvellous day despite what actually happens. This is your system ordering up the day that you have subconsciously described. You can make a conscious decision to order up a fabulous day simply by affirming this when you wake up. That is using power adjectives to describe the day you want to experience. If you don't believe me why not give it a try – you haven’t got anything to lose. To help you out here are 26 words that you could use to order up your everyday special day.

Amazing, brilliant, charming, delicious, extraordinary, fabulous, gorgeous, hilarious, incredible, joyous, kind, loving, marvellous, nice, outstanding, perfect, quality, refreshing, superb, tremendous, unique, victorious, yummy, zestful.

I'm sure there are hundreds more. Do let me know how you get on I'd love to read about your experiences.

The ABC of Money Money Money

2011-09-29T19:24:00.001+01:00

The other day I was looking at my wealth dynamics profile – wealth dynamics is a school of thought proposed by Roger Hamilton based on an ancient Chinese model of personality types. It's quite involved so if you want to know more about it click here. Anyway part of the assessment process required me to explore what motivates me. I was enthusiastically doing this when I suddenly realised that actually, I'm not motivated by money. That's not that I don't wish to have money or that I don't enjoy spending it and accumulating the stuff you can buy with it. (And believe me when I tell you I have got lots of stuff.) However, money isn't the reason for my existence and it is not the reason why I get up in the morning, or the reason that I'm in business or the reason I create things and do the things I do. What drives me is a burning desire to create something different and better than the world we have today.

I mentioned this to my coach (everyone should have a coach irrespective of how secure and balance and successful they consider themselves to be. A fresh pair of eyes on your ego is always worth having; and if you are at the other end of the spectrum those “fresh eyes” can be an objective mirror to reflect your true self). My coach suggested that perhaps I have some limiting beliefs or lack mentality around money which might create a barrier in terms of me acquiring money. To explore whether or not this was the case she set me the task of doing a brainstorm around the words money and wealth.

What this exercise brought up for me is not that I am negative about money itself, but I have a real struggle with the belief systems that makes the accumulation of “it” more important than anything else; especially other people. For “it” you can substitute the word money, or power, or food, or land, or whatever measure you wish to use to represent the resources one needs to sustain one's existence here on Earth.

My analysis of the way in which people relate to money suggests there are three belief systems or attitudes to the accumulation of resources, aka money, operation in the world and I've labelled them A B C:

A: I do not like you. I do not care about you. What you need is none of my concern. You are not like me. You are not important. If I have to kill you or hurt you to have what I want then so be it.

B: I know you are like me; I realise that we are both human and would like to have and need the same things. However, there isn't enough for both of us. The more you have the less there is for me. I would give you some but then what about me. I don't want to hurt you and I won't unless you get in the way of me having what I want. This is not cruel of me; I will love you when and if I can. You understand that don’t you? You would do the same if you were in my shoes.

C: I love you. We are not separate, we are one. Whatever I do for you I am really doing for myself. I love you because loving you means loving me. I can't really do one without the other. If we need the same thing then I'm happy for you to have it even if it means I don't have any because your well-being is my highest concern I would give it all up to you in an instant without question. There is no meaning unless we all thrive together. I cannot see my needs as greater than yours. My mission is to make sure that what I do is good for all, does no harm and serves both me and you. I trust that there is more than enough for all.

If everyone in the world chose to operate as an A we would have mutually assured destruction. If everybody chose to operate as a B we would have more of what we have now, winners and losers. But what if everybody chose to aspire to be a C?

In reality we will always have a mixture of As, Bs and Cs, at least for the foreseeable future. Unlearning our beliefs and drivers is a process not a destination. My relationship with money stems from a desire to hold the vision of C: compassion, contentment, completeness.

What do you think? Is it possible to have a world dominated by Cs? I keep hearing that capitalism, which seems to be the B mentality, is the most efficient mechanism for distributing resources and creating value, but is it? Clearly we will always need to exchange value in a marketplace, but is there a conversation to be started about how this could be done with a lot more C focused transactions? I'd love to know your thoughts.

Life boardcasting live

2011-09-28T23:28:00.001+01:00

Today was my first radio broadcast with a live guest, Carole Pyke, author, speaker, workshop leader, laughter coach, storyteller and marketing specialist who is passionate about words, people and hugs. Carole was amazing, she had such an interesting set of moments and experiences to share; the best of which had to be the fact that she hugged Nelson Mandela. Well she became a Goddess in my eyes immediately.

As you may recall my show on www.playvybz.com goes out live. Broadcasting live is a real lesson in learning to live with “what is” as opposed to striving for perfection. I know I am one of those people who is sometimes immobilised by the need to have everything perfect. (ok so that I didn't sound like a complete basket case, I modified that to say “sometimes” and “some things” when in actual fact “100%” of the time and “everything” would not only be more accurate but also a lot more honest!) I admit it I can be anal when it comes to having to gets things perfect. Worse still, I take out my metaphorical sackcloth and ashes and adorn them if it turns out that what I thought was perfect was indeed marred by a single speck of not “good enough”.

My guest today Carole, said something which will now become my motto; “the only thing I have in common with Superwoman is gender”– nice one Carole; I finally get it; you plus live radio has persuaded me to hang up my cape once and for all.

Yes, it would be great if I didn't occasionally fluff my words; say em more than twice in a sentence; forget to turn on the microphone; forget to turn off the microphone; cue the wrong track or accidentally bang the microphone whilst gesticulated wildly. However, sometimes that’s not how it goes. This is real life, and when it doesn’t go to my plan, there was nothing I can do except just keep going.

Real life doesn’t always give you the opportunity to screw up the piece of paper and start afresh on a new sheet, or yell: cut! Take 120. Action! Sometimes you simply have to live with what you've done. And the strange thing is, not only is life a lot more fun, a lot more relaxed and a lot more real, when you throw way the cape, the spandex pants and the contrasting colour tights; you discover that those little “mistakes” don’t really matter. Everyone gets that you’re human and as they say; Sh*t happens! Even the BBC can't produce perfect live broadcasts 100% of the time and they are the experts with decades of experience.

Life is live, most of the time you only get one take and that’s it, no edit, no reworks. Therefore, rather than trying to get it perfect, just get on and live it, and be happy with your “live” broadcast warts and all.

What is your superhero persona and when was the last time they took a day off? Please share your experiences I love reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of perfect contentment

2011-09-27T23:16:00.000+01:00

Turning over the final card and its moment number 7

Moment of perfect contentment

These moments are connected to achievement, recognition, reaching goals.

My moment of perfect contentment is ordinary, simple and really sums up just how happy I am to have my family. I can remember when it was just my daughter and me. I had left her father for all the right reasons but I stilled longed to be part of a loving relationship.

There used to be this advert on the telly; I can't quite remember what they were advertising. There was this young couple who had a rocking chair and the advert showed the couple's life and how this chair was always with them. So when they bought their first flat, the chair was in the corner; then you saw the woman sitting in the chair rocking a baby and her husband was decorating the walls of the nursery; then you saw her in the chair playing with an older child whilst her husband was with another one on the floor; and then you saw her sitting in the chair doing something to a wedding dress and her husband was arranging something over the phone, etc.

Finally, you see the woman sitting in the chair, she is very old, and she is knitting while her husband is watching the telly. Slowly she lifts her eyes from her knitting; she looks across at him and gives him a beautiful knowing look that just sums up their journey together and their deep love for each other. I remember thinking “I really want that!” That being to be able to look back at a long loving relationship and appreciate everything I had shared with my soul mate; building a home, watching our children grow up and build their own homes and families and being together and still loving each other in our old age.

I finally have it. My perfect moments are when I’m in the kitchen with one of the children and we are talking and then another one of them will join us and then another and finally my husband and we will all be in the kitchen talking and laughing about a day or nothing particular. It is during these moments that I realise I have perfect contentment in the simple things.

The song that sums this up for me is “I'm A Believer” by Smash Mouth (originally by The Monkeys) because it reminds me of the things we do together as a family like watching films. When we watch Shrek, my very musical children dance and sing along to this song in a crazy fun way. It drives my husband nuts, but we always end up laughing.

What is your moment of perfect contentment and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of passion and connection

2011-09-26T23:11:00.000+01:00

Turning over the next card and its moment number 5

Moment of passion and connection
these moments are associated with great loves, significant meaningful relationships, connecting with the people who have a significant impact on your life

It would be very easy to just pick meeting my husband as my moment of passion and connection or looking into the eyes of my first born for the first time on the day she was born, however, I've chosen someone who had a profound effect on the way in which I see things and who I credit with starting me on the road to personal development and positive thinking.

I had decided to retrain as a personal trainer and fitness instructor. I was deeply unhappy at work. I was managing the team from hell. I'm sure my senior managers at the time would explain it differently; however, it seemed to me that they had selected all the worst employees in the department and put them in my team as part of the reorganisation. It felt like I’d been set up to fail, however, being a fighter I was initially determined to prove them wrong.

Sadly the reality was I found myself being crushed by the lack of support and the constant confrontations with my team members who felt that, because they were black and I was a black manager, I should overlook their lack of performance, poor attendance and skills gaps. Which obviously I was not about to do, but the stress I felt due to the constant battles with my staff around performance was awful.

Retraining as a personal trainer was my great escape my chance to go off on my own and do something that I loved, or at the time I thought I would love doing i.e. health and fitness.

One of the women on the course was a woman called Merlyn that she was the liveliest, bubbliest, and most positive person I'd ever met. She has an amazing body - not the usual aerobics instructor look a.k.a. stick thin. She was really Rubenesque and well proportioned and she wore it so well. I would look at her in awe because she was the most confident person I had ever met.

One day I overheard her talking to someone about a very large scar that she had which ran from behind her ear and all the way across the throat. She was explaining how she used make-up to cover it up. As I have a large scar on my face too, the result of an altercation when I was 16, I was interested in what she had to say.

It turned out that this scar was the legacy of an incident in which she was brutally attacked and sexually assaulted by a man who had tricked her into going with him, by telling her that his pregnant girlfriend was in labour and he needed her help. He then attacked her, attempted to slit her throat (hence the scar) and finally in a bid to conceal his crime by destroying the evidence, set fire to the room she was in whilst she lay there unconscious.

Miraculously Merlyn had survived this terrible ordeal. I was stunned that this was her story. How could she have so much pain in her life, in her past and be so positive. I was struggling to remain positive because my job was getting on top of me. So I asked her what kept her positive and I'll always remember what she said.

She said: I realised that he had already taken so much from me I decided that I wasn't prepared to give him the rest of my life.

And that was it. She had worked out that if you choose to hold on to the pain and hurt that others cause you, you give them power over your life. Deciding that you are in control of your life, that you are in fact the CEO and not the supervisor is the greatest gift you can give yourself.

This was the start my journey of self development. The song that sums up this moment of connection for me is

Push It by Salt n Pepa because this was the track that I taught my first ever aerobic routine to. At the time I practiced with Merlyn so much that eventually I couldn't bear to hear the song anymore and this is the first time I've played it in a long while.

What is your moment of passion and connection and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of action

2011-09-25T14:32:00.000+01:00

Turning over the next card and its moment number 3

Moment of action.

Monumental decisions and actions taken as a consequence

My moment of action relates to the decision I made to leave my first long-term relationship with my daughter's father. At the time I was still deeply in love with him and really wanted to be with him, but for some reason he was unable to meet my needs in terms of where I saw my life going.

I had always been highly ambitious coming from a very academic orientated family of top achievers. And although I had got the college degree and was working as a senior planning officer this was where I saw my life in five years time. My plan of action would take me to bigger and better things.

However my partner was very content to remain exactly where he was and I could see that his lack of ambition and drive was slowly destroying me. Even though we had one child together and another one on the way; technically we did live together. It was my flat and he came and went like a migrant worker. Staying with us if things were good and retreating to his second home with his mother when things got tough.

I really felt like a single-parent struggled alone emotionally and financially. I can remember one day walking home pushing my daughter, I was about six months pregnant and all I could think of was that I was doomed. I had visions of me living in a council flat with lots of children for the rest of my life.

It wasn't until sometime later that I realised that the person that was keeping me imprisoned in this life was none other than me. I was in this situation was because I was keeping myself there.

Leaving any relationship is difficult enough however I found it even more difficult because as I said at the time I still deeply loved my partner. However I realise he was like a drug; loving him was like being addicted to crack cocaine. The thing I loved was killing me and so like an addict I needed to give it up before it totally destroyed me.

And that is what I did. The song that reminds me of this decision is L J REYNOLDS - KEY TO THE WORLD because it was a song we often slow danced to while out clubbing. It's a song offering promise based on a lack of reality.

Everyone actually has the keys to the world, the power within themselves to achieve anything they want; unfortunately my partner definitely didn't have the keys to the world. I'm sure if he had he would have given me everything; unfortunately he didn't seem to want to try looking for them.

I wasn’t able to find this track for the radio broadcast so I played Thank You by Jamelia because the lines of the chorus “you broke my world made me strong thank you, messed up my world made me strong thank you” which with hindsight sums up how I feel about this part of my life now. However, the wonders of YouTube mean that I can have both in my blog. Enjoy.

What is your moment of action and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of darkest despair

2011-09-24T21:12:00.000+01:00

My next moment is my Moment of Darkest Despair, which is always the 4 moment to be discussed so that is sandwiched between the positive experiences

Moments of darkest despair

These moments are associated with tragedy, loss and grief. This is not necessarily the loss of a person; it could be the loss of an opportunity, income, status, self belief etc

I know that my moment of darkest despair has to be the loss of my son Peter, who was stillborn. I wasn't sure that I really wanted to talk about this because I couldn’t for so long and so I didn’t for many years.

However, if I'm honest this is my darkest moments and so it's fitting that I include it.

I remember feeling full of guilt, full of regret and full of loss. I cried for so long and replayed the events leading up to that day over and over again as if by doing this I could somehow change the outcome. Every time I re played it, I would change something slightly, a minor detail and hope that the outcome come would be different.

Obviously it never was - this was real life, it wasn't a film that could be edited. I could not go back and change what had happened; but I kept doing it anyway. Until after I'd replayed every possible combination of events at least a thousand times, I realised that it was pointless - it was never going to be different. It had happened to me. It was horrible and it was unfair but it wasn't personal. It just was what it was.

In addition to guilt the other strong sense I recall was feeling like a failure. Not only had Life failed me, but in a strange way I also felt like I'd failed Life too; that I hadn't performed my biological duty as a mother and produced a healthy baby. As a result there was a time when I actively avoided coming into contact with other pregnant women because it felt as if I was going to contaminate them with my failure; and God forbid the same thing happened to them because of me.

I slowly began to realise that I needed to stop blaming myself and forgive myself and others so I could let go and move on. There was no sudden awakening, no sudden healing, it was gradual; a gradual process of forgiving myself and others and moving on.

When my husband and I had our son many years later I finally felt a sense of release. I'd done it. I had produced a healthy baby; I had performed my duty as a mother again.

The song that I have chosen to represent this moment is by Billie Holiday “God bless the Child”: A song of deep lament and regret by someone who shone brightly and burnt out before they really began.

If you have been affected by the loss of a child Sands is an organisation which can offer you support when your baby dies during pregnancy or after birth.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of self-discovery

2011-09-23T20:51:00.000+01:00

Turning over the next card and its moment number 1

Moment of self-discovery

These are moments where you identify your higher purpose or you experience a sudden knowing of who you truly are. Often such moments are associated with spiritual awakening.

My moment of self discovery has to relate to my journey to become an interfaith Minister.

I had been searching for something for a long time and didn't really know what it was I was looking for. I remember going on a training course to discover my life's purpose and coming up with the idea that I was a soul enabler,however, I had no idea what this meant or how I was supposed to do this.

I grew up within the Christian tradition. I remember as a child being dragged (I really mean dragged because once I hit teenage years I didn’t want to spend six hours every Sunday in church) to an all-black evangelistic church. It was full of people who believed that God liked those who paid the most money into the collection. I was not impressed. When the team of Deacons were eventually arrested for fraud it was a shock to everyone except me.

Despite these negative beginnings, I always felt a deep spiritual connection, however, I found myself at odds with much of the Christian teachings. How could there only be one way to know God, that is through Jesus, when two thirds of the world had other paths which they believed in just as strongly; were just as committed to and would argue that they also felt a deep spiritual connection.

As a parent, I found myself wanting to offer my children a spiritual path and so I returned to what was familiar and regularly attended the local Church of England church. I even volunteered to teach Sunday school. I recall regularly changing the message in the sermons. They all seemed to be hung up on the idea of blind obedience or punishment and very little in the way of love and true acceptance of others, which I thought was wrong to impose on young minds.

I longed to leave but I felt like I had nowhere else to go. What brought the matter to a head were 3 events which occurred over a period of two years. With hindsight I can see how they were all leading me to the same conclusion or gently nudging me in the direction that I needed to go.

The first was a dream. I remember that we were on holiday in France at the time. In my dream I was having this heated argument with the Archbishop of Canterbury, or someone very high up in the church and he was asking me to set up a church in my house. Naturally I was having none of it. In my mind I could hear me saying that this was ridiculous and there was no way that I was going to set up a church in my house.

The argument was heated and so vivid it was as if there was somebody else in my head arguing back at me. Anyway it ended when the Archbishop said to me “don't you understand? The only important thing is love. God is not on the outside of you but inside your heart.”

Then suddenly this amazingly brilliant, white light burst out of my chest, through my head my fingertips and the soles of my feet and I was floating in space held by the luminous light. When I woke up I remember feeling very confused but somehow at peace.

The next piece of the puzzle occurred when I was in Tunisia. It was my first visit to a country where the majority of the faith practitioners were Muslims. I remember being amazed by the deep spiritual connection I felt listening to the call to prayer and watching hundreds of people gathering to pray together.

The sense of spirituality was so strong it hung in the air like a heavy fog. I felt really confused: surely these people can't be wrong? How could a loving God witness this much devotion and condemn these people because they weren’t Christians. At the time I didn't have an answer but I knew I could no longer ignore how I felt.

The last thing to happen occurred at the christening of my God son. A good friend of mine, Jackie Holder was leading the proceedings. I recall wondering why my God son’s mother had asked her to lead the ceremony just as she stood up and said "my name is Jackie Holder I'm going to be leading the proceedings and I am an interfaith Minister"

The moment she said the words “Interfaith Minister”, it was like being hit by a bolt of lightning. I suddenly knew that this was what I had to do. I had to do the Interfaith Minister’s course. It was such a deep sense of knowing it felt like a road to Damascus moment. I discovered that the academic year for the new intake of trainee ministers at the seminary was due to start in 10 days time. I knew I had to be on that course and I was.

It was the beginning of a huge turning point in my life. Training as an interfaith Minister and spiritual counsellor freed me from so much of the fear that until then dominated my life. It allowed me to express my spirituality in a way that really suited me and accept everyone’s different spiritual path as different and equally valid. The song I’ve chosen to represent this moment is a song from an album called Sacred Sounds of Santeria: Rhythms of the Orishas.

I recall initially being terrified to embrace the other faiths; particularly ones that were not based on the Bible. I had to overcome the fear and distrust I had been taught about other faiths i.e. not only were they misguided they were also sinning against God. So being able to listen to this Santeria chant and fully accept this spiritual tradition as a way of connecting to the God of my understanding without feeling fear, is a beautiful reminder of what becoming interfaith Minister has given me.

What is your moment of self-discovery and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments: My moment of persistence

2011-09-22T17:22:00.000+01:00

Turning over the next card and its moment number 5

The Moment of Persistence

choosing not to give up

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I never give up. I will stick at something relentlessly and if necessary find a different way of doing it . So persistence is an everyday feature of my life. My moment of persistence reflects the closest I have ever felt to accepting defeat and giving up. That is running the London Marathon in 1991 – 20 years ago.

The training was gruelling. That particular winter was very bitter and I remember going running every evening and my ears being so cold they felt like they could snap off.

But I got through the 40 to 60 miles running you have to do each week. The advice you are given about training for the marathon states that you don't actually have to practice running a whole marathon. i.e. you don't have to run 26 miles before the actual race.

If you can run 13 miles comfortably they say that you should be able to complete the marathon. I'd actually manage 17 miles as the longest distance I'd run in a single training session so I felt totally prepared. That is until I hit the wall at 19 miles. I have blog about what it is like to hit the wall in a previous blog, however to save you having to look it up here is the description again:

"The wall: after running continuously for about 19 to 21 miles your body reaches a point where the only really effective way of conveying the experience is with the use of imagery from the most gory, hellish horror movies you've ever seen. You know the ones that make you look away from the screen and wince before peeking out from half closed eyes to see what other parts of the victim's anatomy are being sliced, flailed, torn, shredded, nailed etc by the bad evil thing doing all the damage. The wall is like personally experiencing the pain and torture in all these films at once. Hell is too pleasant a word. Having been through childbirth a number of times, I'd say possibly that might come close ...well maybe not. But you get the picture.

Hitting the wall is literally like hitting a brick wall at 1000 miles per hour, front on, without the protection of any form of vehicle.

It is so painful, you think that it is not possible to move any part of your body at all, let alone put one leg in front of the other. However, it's do or die. If you stop you've had it. You know you will be out of the running for the medal and certificate with 40,080th in 4hrs 20 min proudly exhorting your achievements. This is the point that separates the pack into “the finishers” and the "sorry not this time Joes".

Running past the wall has got to be one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life. I’d just passed the 19 miles mark when I hit it. Hell, pain, disbelief that moving could be that difficult. As I got slower and slower I realised I was coming to a stop and if I stopped I would never start again. Then suddenly I could hear my name being called.

"Auntie Ola, Auntie Ola, yeah, Auntie Ola, Auntie Ola"

It was my two nieces and their mum who were watching in the crowd cheering me on, willing me to keep going. Three small voices of encouragement in a crowd of thousands all shouting different things. But it was enough to re-energise me and slowly I started to run a bit faster, eventually getting back into the flow. I waved to them and kept going to the finish line.

Sometimes when the going gets tough, in order to keep moving forward, you need a little bit of encouragement from someone you know cares about you succeeding. Make sure that on your way up to your success; remember to take these people with you. You never know when you might need them to cheer you on. "

The song that represents this moment for me is Jackie Wilson's Your Love Keeps Lifting Me Higher And Higher because the love of my nieces lifted me to the heights of success by keeping me going.

What is your moment of persistence and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.

Tycoon Women Moments - Live on air

2011-09-21T23:46:00.000+01:00

Today was the very first broadcast of my live Tycoon Women Moments radio show. Apart from a slight hiccup with an open mike and announcing the wrong track, I think it went amazingly well. What's more, I really enjoyed it. If you recall, yesterday I was stressing myself out because I didn't think I had enough interesting moments in my life to justify being the very first guest on the 7 rhythms of life feature that is going to be a regular part of the show. This is the part of the show where I invite a guest to tell their story via a series of pivotal moments in their lives and link these to songs which were either significant at the time or have, with hindsight come to represent those events. Anyway I managed to identify seven moments to talk about, which I've decided to serialise here in my blog over the next seven days. The order in which the moments are recounted is selected by turning over a playing card. The first of my seven moments is moment number two: The Moment Of Clarity (perception)

These moments are to do with finding your passion and/or identifying your life's work/ purpose.

My Moment of clarity (perception)

It was hard for me to choose a single moment of clarity as there have been many times in my life where I've suddenly become extremely clear about what I need to do next. However the one I've chosen is the most recent; when I chose to leave my job after working for my employer for more than 20 years and take the humongous step – well it seemed humongous to me - to step away from a regular salary cheque, set up my own business and become self-employed.

It took me 20 years to get to this point of clarity of knowing that what I was doing was not the work I was here to do; was not how I was going to make my difference in this world.

However I had been ignoring the signs the gentle rain drops splashing against my window pane of life, hinting that I needed to be doing something else. These changed into a rain shower, then a storm and then hurricane Katrina or Hugo.

Like many people all I knew was being an employee. My salary was enough to ensure we lived a very comfortable life; I had a lot of autonomy in my job and it was very easy to imagine me staying in this role forever. On the face of it I should have been happy, however I knew that this was not the work I really wanted to do and things were changing radically due to increasing budget constraints. Consequently my employer was giving me very strong hints that it was time to move on.

What helped me to get clear was working with a coach; my employer had decided that all senior managers needed one-on-one personal development coaching so that they would be better equipped to support staff in the areas that they were planning to “downsize” in the future. As a bi-product of this, I had a real opportunity to re-examine what I wanted in life. And what I wanted was to follow my passion and that, funnily enough, was personal development and coaching.

Being clear was one thing convincing family and friends that I hadn’t completely lost the plot was another - although I must say they have all been very supportive.

It really is important to have supportive people around you to encourage you to follow your dreams. Because if you don't the clarity that you start out with can quickly become muddied and clouded by the doubts unsupportive people introduce into your mind. You will never be short of people lining up to pour oil on your dreams and set them alight. Therefore, either walk with a fire extinguisher so that you can quickly put the fire out, or avoid these sort of people altogether.

The song I've chosen to represent this moment in my life is a song by Louis Armstrong. I've always been a great fan of Louis Armstrong. When I used to teach aerobics I would use this track as the Revitaliser at the end of the class. The Revitaliser is designed to wake you up and to get you going again after the cool down stretch. The song is When the Saints Go Marching In. For me it's always been a real energiser, a real go get them song and once I was clear about what I wanted to do this is exactly how I felt.

I will tell you about my next moment tomorrow.

What is your moment of clarity and what song would you use to represent it? Please share your thoughts and experiences so others can benefit. I look forward to reading about them.