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I went to Omega to work with Carolyn Myss a couple weekends ago and one of the archetypes that she talks about is the Prostitute Archetype.
Think of it for a second. How are you willing to sell anything if the price is right? Whether we sell our time with our families, our values, or our health, it does not matter it is a sale of, as Carolyn Myss put it, a part of our soul that stops us from ever really being happy.
In order to make sure that you don’t sell your soul you need to know where it lives and how to care for it.
When your work is about success and fulfillment you do a lot of thinking about how to live the best possible life. Here is a list of some of the keys to living a deeply fulfilled life.
Passion:
1. Figure out what you love. People are happier when they know what they love.
2. Do it often. Doing what you love makes you feel more fulfilled.
3. Remove things from your life that are mediocre, beige, flat or merely being tolerated. You only have so much time attention and energy don’t waste it on what does not matter.
Courage:
1. Know what is important to you.
2. Know why it is important to you.
3. Because, “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear.” F. Roosevelt
Kindness:
1. Learn to be good to others and do it as much as possible.
2. Learn to be good to yourself and do it as much as possible
3. Go out of your way everyday to do something especially nice for a total stranger.
Gratitude:
1. Pay attention to all the wonderful things that are a part of your life both large and small.
2. Thank people for what they bring to your life.
3. Learn to find gratitude even for the things and people that are difficult
Contemplation:
1. Take a few moments every day to sit quietly.
2. Keep a journal.
3. Learn to listen fully to what someone is saying. Really take it in before responding.
Forgiveness:
1. Make a list of everyone in your life that you have an unresolved issue with and find a way to resolve it within yourself and if possible with them.
2. Forgive yourself.
3. Make it a practice to forgive others as quickly as possible.
Play:
1. Make time to be creative in ways that please you the most.
2. Laugh as much as possible.
3. Remember that your life is what you dream it to be.
Looking for personal growth work that will guide you through making the changes you need to make for your fulfillment and support you as you step fully into a more fulfilled and happy life? Your answer may be LifeWork Community. Learn more here.
For today’s aspiring entrepreneur, exploring avenues of creativity to find your passion is likely the quickest route to increase your chances of launching a successful business. Where to start? Here, five exercises to help you uncover your passion.
Exercise 1 – Revisit your childhood. What did you love to do? “It’s amazing how disconnected we become to the things that brought us the most joy in favor of what’s practical,” says Rob Levit, an Annapolis, Md.-based creativity expert, speaker and business consultant.
Levit suggests making a list of all the things you remember enjoying as a child. Would you enjoy that activity now? For example, Frank Lloyd Wright, America’s greatest architect, played with wooden blocks all through childhood and perhaps well past it.
“Research shows that there is much to be discovered in play, even as adults,” Levit says.
Revisit some of the positive activities, foods and events of childhood. Levit suggests asking yourself these questions to get started: What can be translated and added into your life now? How can those past experiences shape your career choices now?
Exercise 2 – Make a “creativity board.” Start by taking a large poster board, put the words “New Business” in the center and create a collage of images, sayings, articles, poems and other inspirations, suggests Michael Michalko, a creativity expert based in Rochester, N.Y., and Naples, Fla., and author of creativity books and tools, including ThinkPak (Ten Speed Press, 2006).
“The idea behind this is that when you surround yourself with images of your intention — who you want to become or what you want to create — your awareness and passion will grow,” Michalko says. As your board evolves and becomes more focused, you will begin to recognize what is missing and imagine ways to fill the blanks and realize your vision.
Exercise 3 – Make a list of people who are where you want to be. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Study people who have been successful in the area you want to pursue.
For example, during the recession, many people shied away from the real estate market because they thought it was a dead end. Levit believes that’s the perfect time to jump in — when most others are bailing out — because no matter the business, there are people who are successful in it. Study them, figure out how and why they are able to remain successful when everyone else is folding and then set up structures to emulate them.
“If you want to be creative, create a rigorous and formal plan,” Levit says. “It’s not the plan that is creative; it’s the process that you go through that opens up so many possibilities.”
Exercise 4 – Start doing what you love, even without a business plan A lot of people wait until they have an extensive business plan written down, along with angel investors wanting to throw cash at them — and their ideas never see the light of day, according to Cath Duncan, a Calgary, Canada-based creativity expert and life coach who works with entrepreneurs and other professionals.
She recommends doing what you enjoy — even if you haven’t yet figured out how to monetize it. Test what it might be like to work in an area you’re passionate about, build your business network and ask for feedback that will help you develop and refine a business plan.
It’s a way to not only show the value you would bring, but you can also get testimonials that will help launch your business when you’re ready to make it official.
“Perhaps most importantly, though, it’ll shift you out of paralysis and fear,” Cath says, “and the joy of seeing the difference your contribution makes will fuel your creativity.”
Exercise 5 – Take a break from business thinking. While it might feel uncomfortable to step outside of business mode, the mind sometimes needs a rest from such bottom-line thinking, says Levit, who has recently taken up Japanese haiku, a form of poetry. Maybe for you, it will be creative writing, painting, running or even gardening.
After you take a mental vacation indulging in something you’re passionate about, Levit suggests coming back to a journal and writing down any business ideas that come to mind.
“You’ll be amazed at how refreshed your ideas are,” he says. “Looking at beautiful things – art and nature – creates connections that we often neglect to notice. Notice them capture, them in writing and use them.”
reblogged from Entreprenuer.com
The question that I am asking myself lately is, “Are things in my business and life in alignment with my personal truth and vision?”
In other words – Am I being true to myself? Which is a very important question if we are going to walk our talk in our lives and businesses.
There have been a few things that have stood out to me as I do this inventory: community, place, artistry, and commitment. I have been looking at the local food movement, the holistic and integrative care models, community arts, and qualitative research methods.
In general, I have been looking to sharpen my intention around how much healing effect business can have and how much it can improve our quality of life.
I think money is a very important part of business. But if it becomes the most important part of business, maybe that is not for everyone. I am taking a stand for a business model that is not about creating another corporations but creating a lifestyle.
No, sweeping changes but I foresee some fabulous adjustments in the upcoming year. Some of which, you will be seeing sooner rather than later. And the best part about it is that every step I take in this direction the more fabulous things get. I can’t wait to keep updating you as I make this transition through the month of July!
I have watched lots of heart-centered people struggle to get their work with their message out there because they are unable to deal with the realities of the financial side of their work. It seems that, when we care a lot, we sometimes try to prove it by making statements about how it is our love, not our pocketbook, that prompts our actions. Somewhere along the line it was as if we were sneakily given the choice of either loving our work or making a profit from it. There are many different ways we can do this; however, each is problematic. And… each can be remedied.
In order to get our messages out into the world, we need resources and skills. These resources come in all shapes and sizes — and one of those is money. Suzanne Evans says it is not that money is the most important thing — it clearly is not — but it touches everything that is important.
In my opinion, those of us who care about making a difference are, in one way or another, trying to create healing in the world. At its most basic level, healing is just the natural flow of energy, in which money is just a medium of exchange. It is a statement of perceived value. There are, of course, other ways to communicate value, but money is one of them.
If our projects do not have money, we will be unable to get them out to as large of an audience — or, at the very worst, we will be unable to continue doing our work. This makes dealing with money a central issue of importance.
My tip for those of you who struggle with money — especially when you’re asking for money for yourself or your services — is to switch mindsets from selling to people to serving people. In other words, if you know you have something that can help others, why would you not let them know it is available to them? You might have heard this language before but have not really understood what it is about. I suggest you spend some time thinking about how you can better serve people by letting them know what you have to offer.