I’ve got some New Year’s advice that you’re probably not going to like.
If you’re holding onto anything that has become old and useless, throw it away. If you’re holding on the anything that is constantly in your way or carrying around something that only has the purpose of weighing you down (excluding ankle weights for a workout, of course), throw it away.
This applies to the mental and emotional hang-ups that have been nagging at you since childhood. This applies to the relationships with people and organizations that do not empower you.
This applies doubly to all the old physical stuff that you’ve collected over time that you truly hate, and do nothing but get in the way and keep you from getting the new things you truly want.
Feeling cluttered and choked by stuff will make you push back any new opportunities that may arrive at your mental or literal door step. You might be afraid to let the opportunity see your place as such a disaster, or you might just know that you have no more room for more stuff, even if it is the good stuff.
Those hard feelings left behind by an old friend who never apologized from doing you wrong. Years of doubt of your success as you have been actively living it. Shoeboxes of old love letters from a lover three love’s ago, or worse, receipts from ten years ago, long reconciled.
In trying to live a life where every space is a place, if that space is just a place holder for something that brings misery, pain, or even no feeling whatsoever, and you could easily replace it with something that would instantly give you joy, what are you waiting for?
I have found myself with some bona fide free time as I am winding down to the end of 2008. As a result, I'm having a less stressful time in my 2009 goal making and business planning. Yes, actually goal making and business planning and not just scribbling stuff down on random sheets of paper to shuffle through for the first few weeks of the year. Even better, I have been able to make time to research and put my ideas into some semblance of logical order (thought spelling and grammar will always be a little suspect).
As I continue setting up my goal plans, I have been sifting through some of the on-line tools I have collected to see which ones will be most useful for getting in gear for the new year (check out my mad rhyming skills, yo!), and wanted to share a few with y'all. Here are some sources for free stuff to get your business or personal life in line for the year 2009 (I'm a poet and I didn't even know it...):
Today's TQ
Today's TQ offers a daily system designed to remind you to achieve your personal best. That's right, remind you that you can and should give your all everyday to stay committed to your dreams. They start you out with a extensive test to gauge you current level in 10 factors to your overall success, and for a small fee you can purchase your own personal book on yourself and audio programs to help you raise your scores. But you want free stuff, and they have plenty of pdfs with calendars and planning tools to help you out.
Have you been putting up Facebook status updates for the past three months proclaiming you're cleaning your office? Well I have, and I'm no where near finished yet. Assuming you have the same issue with clutter creep, but aren't so vocal about it, the Fly Lady has all the tricks you could ever dream of, and says if you take it 15 minutes at a time, you'll eventually find your way to clean. We won't go into how many 15 minute intervals you can accumulate in three months.
Your need for free software alternatives and mobile access to computer programs are both solved at PortableApps.com, where a USB flash drive is all you need to carry your favorite computer programs with you, along with all of your bookmarks, settings, email and more. Portable versions of popular open source applications are offered here free, with no spyware and no limitations.
For free guilt moral support for getting yourself in shape this year, I'm offering up a new site I am still getting the hang of: Dailymile. It is described as a social training log for runners, triathletes, and cyclists, and is an easy way to share your training with friends and stay motivated, assuming you need a little one-up-manship as part of your motivation. Look up and share local races and post your workout time to throw in the face of compare with friends you make on the site.
The United States of America, while we've got plenty of serious problems, is in my opinion the greatest nation on the planet. I admit my bias, but I also provide here my 'indisputable proof'* to the fact, also know as my list of things I am grateful for in living in this country:
- you are truly born with infinite possibilities - you are limited by your own imagination - we are not waring with our neighbors - stupid, while often annoying and occasionally dangerous, is itself not a crime - we are nation of second nearly infinite chances (helping those who are stupid...) - the purely talentless can somehow thrive in any economy
* 'Indisputable proof' may in fact be disputed. My only response is "Yeah, what's your point? U-S-A! U-S-A!”
One of early members of child was wanting to be President of the United States. Then, I wanted to be President of NBC. Then a DJ. Then a center for the Atlanta Hawks. Somewhere along the way I ended up going to college to be study to be an engineer, and ended up being an Air Force Acquisitions Officer, to give it all up to become a DJ.
Never once did the thought of becoming a fireman cross my mind. But that is main role with my company, despite every effort I take to make it otherwise. This becomes more apparent every time I take a true day off like I did Tuesday...then came back to mass insanity of half-projects yesterday...which lead to me working about 6 hours (so far) on work related project on this supposed day off...and will drive probably drive me insane as I am slated to take off every Tuesday and Thursday in the month of December to burn my vacation days.
Because the real reason I hate taking the day off and being to myself: I can effectively schedule a productive day for myself. I can also be flexible enough for interruptions and emergencies. In fact, I found I could make a list of things to do for the day, and then could chose to blow off every activity on the entire list, and would have found some way to accomplish something.
At work, I often begin with a long list of things to get done, and find myself quickly confronted with various ‘emergencies’ that take me away from my list that after completion didn’t pan out to be exactly emergencies. And I always end the day by leaving work late, and always leaving work frustrated from not making any actual progress in the job.
Unfortunately, I can not change my fate at work (oh, have I tried...) at this moment, and as I choose to continue showing up every morning, I am stuck with the weary and tireless (yes, I know they mean the same thing) life of a fireman, keeping a corporation from coming down on itself.
But for you, I offer some advice. If you find yourself stressed out at work by maximum effort but minimum, if any, progress, steal a moment to yourself and think about what your workday might be missing:
A Routine: the act of following a ritualistic daily routine will help you easily gage your progress in your daily tasks...unless you routinely never get anything done.
Proper Focus: the ability to focus on a single goal as you move toward it, or even focus on a single task as you try to finish it, will do wonders for your sanity and productivity.
A Score Card: I might not have mastered getting anything checked off my daily master list, but I still attempt it. Your to do list becomes your roadmap to success, or at least a way to gauge when you have finished something.
A System To Keep People Away: If you don’t plan out what you are going to do with your time, someone else will easily fill that time up for you. But if you have bosses that respect what you do for you company and themselves personally, they will find ways to divert some of the problem children and their problem projects far enough away from their office aces (you are an office ace, right?) to minimize distractions. If the boss can’t help, partner up with a co-worker to work a little misdirection for each other. And if you are lucky enough to be a supervisor, make sure you take good care of that assistant who is able to say “no” in just the right manner to get the point across.
Welcome to my new blog. This is where I will chronicle the next phase of mis-adventures of my life. Thank you for staying on the ride, and for you newcomers to the inside of my mental mania, I will do my best to make sure the trip is both entertaining and educational.
Life In Fast Forward: The Blog is still a bit of a work in progress. Keep checking in for new posts and site updates.
About Blog
This blog supports some of the thoughts and interjections from the folks at Fast Forward Business Properties. Our ideas, things we test, and a few random thoughts will show up here.
Name: J. Cleveland Payne
Home: Little Rock, Arkansas, United States
About Me: News is my profession, so it only fits that I am a news junkie. I'm a radio show/segment producer for a news/talk radio station in Little Rock, Arkansas.
