33 days – The Striped Couch challenges you!

Oh dear too many distractions – finding it a challenge to write today.  The Buddhists call it ‘monkey mind‘ – sound familiar?  You start with a single thought and before you know it, that thought has climbed through your brain like a monkey on a mission!  One thought has become a thousand and all of a sudden I can’t construct a sentence, let alone a story…  Lucky inspiration has struck!  My ever present muse, the wonderfully sophisticated and Oracle of all knowledge – Google – has come to my rescue!  Thank you Larry and Sergey, I am grateful!

In a bid to get the creative juices flowing, I inadvertently found my next post – 33 ways to be creative (unfortunately my searching skills seem to be a bit off today and I am unable to find the author of the picture attached, if anyone knows, please contact me or if you are the author, please get in touch).  It’s an inspiring list, just take a look below.  It’s not only for the ‘creative type’ – it’s for everyone…  And to prove that, I’ve come up with a challenge for you:  print out  the picture below and stick it to your mirror.  There are 33 items on the list, commit to doing each one of them (one a day) for 33 days. Make it a competition with your other half/friends,  get your mum and dad involved, tell the children (you’ll be pleasantly surprised to see how infectious the optimism of children is).  And at the end of each day, share with <insert whoever here> and find out how the task for the day went.  Challenge your Status Quo and see the difference it makes in your life.  My personal favourite on the list is number #25, I try to do this every day.  How about you?

Use the ‘Don’t be shy, say something‘ box to let me know if you’ve taken the up The Striped Couch’s 33 day challenge.  And as usual if you want any advice or guidance, just drop me a message and I’ll get back to you.

Go for it!

33 ways to stay creative

 

Status quo

Christmas is done and dusted.  Bring on New Years!   And, as we all know, New Year is a time for those well-to-do resolutions, the ones that last a week, maybe two – but before you know it, they are gone and our well meant intentions have evaporated and we are back to living in our daily bondage.  Have you wondered why that is?  Or have you just accepted it to be a truth and kept the status quo?

Well, there you have it my friends, the answer is always within your reach:  You’ve kept the status quo.  So in an effort to keep you inspired and make those resolutions stick this coming year, I thought I’d share a quote with you that’s got me excited and charged for 2013.  However, proceed with caution, the following is not for the faint hearted.  He tells it like it is and it’s a strong tonic for some.  Ready? Okay lets go!

“Seriously, if you always put limits on what you can do, physical or anything else, it’ll spread over into the rest of your life. It’ll spread into your work, into your morality, into your entire being. There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level.”

-Bruce Lee

I love this quote!   Bruce Lee is telling you like it is – limits are self imposed.  We create limits and once we do, they take over lives.  The scary thing is, we are all so blind to this kind of behaviour that it becomes common place in our lives and we perpetuate the cycle of ‘status quo’ without even realising that we are in fact affecting our entire lives.  As I said, we create limits.  But the worst part of all of this is when we start making excuses to justify why we create these limits!  This is what is referred to as a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Very simply:  You start believing your excuses and accept it as your reality.  And this is most common during New Years.  We have the best intentions (for example losing weight) but a week in, we feel challenged so we create an excuse.  ‘It’s too cold in the mornings to go to the gym or go for a jog, I’ll do it after work’.  After work arrives and another excuse ‘oh its’ been such a long, hard day at the office, I’ll do it in the morning’.  And so forth.  Once you’ve said it to yourself enough times – ‘its too cold in the mornings and I’m too tired after work’ – that is what you believe.  It’s not an excuse anymore, it’s your reality.

Remember what I said in my first post (Shadow Shibari) – the first step to making a change is becoming self aware.  We cannot fix what we do not know is broken.  But now you KNOW.  You know that the next time you start making excuses for keeping the status quo, you are limiting yourself and that by believing your excuses, you are creating your own reality.

Ask yourself – is that really the reality you want to be living in?  You really are the master of your own destiny. Change the status quo.