How To Pick Your Team: A.I.M.

"People come into your life for a reason, season or a lifetime..."

"Don't mix seasonal people with lifetime expectations."

These are a couple of the advice offered to me and now I am passing on to you as you take up today's #BreakingLoose Challenge.

Not everyone batting, catching or playing mid-field is meant to remain in either that position or on your team forever. As any good and experienced coach will tell you, players get injured, complacent or simply cannot continue to meet the physical requirements of the game.

You are the head coach, the boss, the CEO - whatever title you prefer - of your life. You determine how the game will be played and you select the players to go out on the field with and for you.

Sentiments and sympathy will not "win" you this game.

Before anyone takes offence to what is meant by my chosen words, let me define how they are being used:

• Game - daily living
• Players - friends, family members, influencers in your life
• Field - your scope of choices
• Win - success according to your understanding

Often I have made reference to T.D. Jakes' Three Types of People in Your Life. Earlier today on my Facebook page, I posted a diagram about "The Circle of Five." Now, I am offering you my own combination of these two concepts as you set out to complete a review or performance evaluation if you like of your team.

The most important and fundamental thing to understand is that it all starts with You.

You are the visionary - the dreamer, the leader, the head cook and bottle washer of your Life. It starts and ends with You. The "game" is played according to your choices or lack of choices. You select the players based on how you want to play the game. You decide which player remains on your team.

Once the vision is clear, refined and fine-tuned - and you do this every year, every month, every day through your vision boards, journals, meditation/spiritual exercises, etc - you write your guidelines. These I prefer to call "Values for Living," and they are those principles that will not change, they are who you are. My Values For Living include: 

• Love
• Honesty 
• Trustworthiness 
• Loyalty 
• Faithfulness
• Kindness

We all have a story for our lives, one that we edit, adapt and expand as we play this game. Knowing your story and ensuring that only you are holding the pen is critical. The pages of this story is written every day. It is the daily walking of your vision, it is the game and you get to choose the players, companions and supporting actors. My suggestion is that each of these persons are chosen based on their:

• Appreciation and understanding of your story
• Interest, ability and willingness to support you moving your story to the next stage
• Mission in their own lives

Basically, the A.I.M. of your team members will and ought to determine their seasonality, reason or lifetime membership on your playing field.

For as long as their appreciation of you and your journey is well expressed and evident, they might remain on the team. This does not mean they are yes people. It simply means they love you enough to tell you the truth as they work side by side with you to correct the course.

If a team member interests change or dwindle; should they become unwilling or unable to continue catching your vision for the game, their season is over. No hard feelings necessary. It is simply time to move on.

Each of us have a mission for our lives and part of that includes being an active player or supporter on another person's team. We are social beings and our natural instinct is to help another. For as long as that support is mutually beneficial, life-enhancing for both parties - game on! However, missions change, adjustments get made and what was once compatible evolve not necessarily into conflicting goals but are no longer viable. Do not hang on out of habit. Thank and bless the player. Retire their number and give them a golden handshake however that looks in your life. Then start recruiting.

There you have my 3-point strategy for playing your game. Evaluate your current team based on their A.I.M. and take your life to the next base.

Be blessed and have a great game day!

Stop Striving And STRIDE

You keep doing and doing but it seems to continually elude you.

Every morning you get up, dress your best, be one of the first to arrive, maybe you even put on coffee and have lunch at your desk but come promotion time - bypassed!

Bought the car but it is not the dream one. Maybe next couple of years you can. Got a mortgage but only for a one bedroom so the living room is the makeshift bedroom for your child. That will improve say in five years, you think.

You dress well, your body not in too bad a shape and your face is really easy on any beholder's eyes but the love of your life seem to be blind!

On all or some, a couple or even one front you are striving to succeed but it just is not happening. Fatigue is setting in, not to mention frustration. Every motivational, relationship and financial expert you consult tell you to "keep at it girl!"

For how much longer? That is your question!

It certainly was mine. Then I stopped. I checked myself. No warning other than sitting at rock bottom on the relationship, then financial fronts and there was no where else to go.

Nothing seemed to work for me until I learned to stop my striving and struggling. A believer that like attracts like, eventually it became crystal clear to me that for all my striving, I was getting more reasons to strive and struggle.

The moment stillness - literally, spiritually and emotionally - became my stance, things began to change for me.

Yet to win a multimillion dollar lottery, I am comfortable with my finances. Still single, I am happy with the relationship with me and that which I have with dear friends. Every would-be financial or relationship (speaking here about the intimate type) challenge that formerly might have had me flapping my wings about in a panic, now find me calmly taking them in S.T.R.I.D.E:

Source provides

This too shall pass

Right answers always come

I am capable

Deal with what is

Embrace the lesson and move on

"Take every endeavor in your stride. If it succeeds it is wonderful, if there is setback, it is experience." Anil Sinha

What can you STRIDE towards in your life right about now? Leave a comment here or visit me on my personal coaching page and let us stride together.

Namaste

The Secret: Fail To Succeed

Clara Brown

"Don't wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great.  Weak men wait for opportunities, strong men make them." Orison Swett Marden.

How often have you heard the saying "Life is what you make it?"

What the hell does it mean? How do you embrace the results whether you are 'making it' or not?

At the risk of being labelled repetitive, I am again about to quote my late mother.  It really is hard for me not to make reference to her utterances as she was the kind of woman who spoke a lot and was rarely proven wrong. Well, that is how it seemed to us her children. Now, as adults we see the wisdom in her words and her vision. She was indeed a simple yet wise and humble soul.

"Life is what you make it," she often said.  "Opportunities are presented to us every day. If you want to be happy, you can and will be happy.  If you want to be sad, you can and will be sad.  If you want to be successful, you have to go out and work for it.  Success will not just fall in you lap."

The "making it" does take work:

• Work to overcome your fears and failings.
• Work to convert the dream into reality. 
• Work to seize opportunities and turn them into the something tangible

All in all, "making it' is WORK!!!

It is an established fact that we will not succeed in every opportunity.  With time and a large enough number of them, we learn that failing is part of life.  Failures are part of the picturesque route to ultimate success.  They are the lessons that fuel our growth.

Image: pfitblog.com

I have had my fair share of failures. "What? You Clara?" Of course I have and they have been a few, including:

1. Failed at examination
2. Failed at having long lasting relationships
3. Failed at investment opportunities
4. Failed at achieving some goals related to my profession.

I could go on. In the final analysis, all of these failings taught me unique lessons as well commonly known lessons.

"A brilliant child," is what many called me. Reading fluently, I am told, at age 3, my tests were always passed with 'flying colors' right up to sixth grade in primary (elementary) school.  It was, therefore, expected by all that I would pass my Common Entrance Exams at the first sitting. The Common Entrance is the test Grade 6 students in Jamaica sat to move on to Secondary Level. This test has since been replaced by the infamous Grade Six Achievement Test (G.S.A.T.)

Then came the shock. I DID NOT PASS.

That was my first experience with the concept of failure.  My teachers were in shock, I was in shock but alas, my mother expressed no such emotion.

Very apprehensive, waiting for an explosion from her, I walked around the house on pins and needles for days. It took that before my mother said anything about my "failure." She must have sensed that depression was lurking in me when one day she finally said, "Pickney, di blow whey nuh bruk yuh back will mek it stronga!" (Translation: Child, the blow that does not break your back will make it stronger.)

Image: 10formation.blogspot.com

In my adult years at a session facilitated by Les Brown, he said something along the same lines and it immediately resonated with me. I have used that phrase many times since to lift myself up from the space tagged with the letters F-A-I-L.  The Common Entrance failure is today quite laughable compared to some of my subsequent ones.

It has been my fortune to be able to see the proverbial glass as half full. Frankly, people who constantly see the dark clouds without any hope for the silver linings are not interesting to me. My patience quota is great for people who need a bit of reminding but absolutely none for persons who are perpetually negative. If there is anything that drains my energy as being in the same space with negative people. Immediately the wilting begins!

Of all the secrets in the world, one of the most view-changing is to be able to transform some failures into successes. Just do not stop!  Keep trying, working and take advantage of opportunity after opportunity. This formula worked for me and continues to work in my life and in my friends' lives - those who have been willing to "Just Do It!" In spite of my failings, I remained thankful - don't raise your eyebrows - that is another secret, gratitude, and I am one grateful Chick.

"Life is too short...Don't ever waste it!Life is sweet......Take time to taste it!Life is a journey.....Find the right path!Life is entertaining.....Don't be afraid to laugh!Life is for good times .....Make them last!Life has its bad times....Put them in your past!Life is chance.....Make sure you take it,But most importantly ..........Life is what you make it!" Anonymous

If you need a little boost, contact us through our Facebook page. You are also invited to share your thoughts here and follow us on Twitter.

Continue to have a great day!

Clara Brown is a member of DOS and a Guest Author of our blog. She is an insurance executive and resides in Kingston, Jamaica.

The Poverty of Things: A Diva's Perspective

Clara Brown - Guest Author

“Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies" Mother Theresa

My tiny District of Gibraltar, St. Ann is barely a dot on the map of Jamaica. Yet it was here, in the deep rural parts, that my five siblings and I spent our formative years.  These years paved our way to the highways and byways of opportunity and prepared us all for the sometimes unchartered terrains. We were pioneers in many ways, as our much older cousins, who represented success to our young and impressionable minds, did not travel the courses we took.                                                                               

We did not have much in terms of ‘things’. We had enough – by our standard -  but down the road from our three bedroom house and hall, there was Miss Daisy and Maas Joe. At 6' tall, Maas Joe was not only perceived to ‘run his house’ but was the most successful farmer and modern day equivalent of an  "Entrepreneur."

Maas Joe was successful and, incidentally, he was a  distant cousin of my mother. He and his household had “THINGS,” including a car and a massive house that was located right in the district’s square.  The downstairs of the house was a huge, in my youthful eye,  grocery shop and the upstairs were the living quarters. Maas Joe owned most of the lands in the area, perhaps hundreds of acres, and boy did he work them!   

Whenever he is working on the farm, Maas Joe would load the only Land Rover pick-up in the area with labourers of all ages. He owned numerous herds of cattle that grazed on the fodder adjacent to the Primary School that I attended.  Maas Joe had “THINGS."

Perhaps they were fleeting moments of ‘need’ but sometimes I wished Maas Joe was my father.

I was cognizant that with a fairly good supply of “THINGS," one could possibly live comfortably and would be able to buy anything he/she wanted. Looking back, something now dawns on me.  Miss Daisy and Maas Joe did not smile, at least not in public. There was no raucous laughter echoing through their doors onto the street.

My Church - Jerusalem School Room

More significant, there was no gathering of the sisters (Miss Coolie - my mother, Miss Tuxie and the youngest Miss Pulachie).  After church, the sisters would gather to exchange their weekend blessing of deliciously cooked rice and peas and chicken.  How many ways can one cook fricassee chicken?

Most Sundays, the sisters cooked the same foods, yet they exchanged meals and joyous, gut-busting laughter and anything else that could be thrown into the mix of 'togetherness'. It was never about “THINGS” for these three.  They also shared an ever-amusing interaction as they started speaking in a strange 'gypsy' language.  Us children were always fascinated when they started this charade. Instead of taking this as the cue to leave the room, we hovered in a corner within ear-shot until frustration set in as we could not decipher what they were saying.

It was never about “THINGS."

Our house was situated close to the Baptist Church and our cellar was the storage for the slippers and walking shoes of the ladies who travelled miles to attend church. Our 'facilities' provided relief for them in preparation for the 3-hour long service. We were awaken every Sunday by 5:30 a.m. to clean said 'facilities'. The early wake up was to ensure it was presentable for the first ‘stranger’ who came by.  “Stranger” for us simply meant someone who did not live in our household.  

My dearly departed Mother was an upstanding “Market Woman” with an extremely loyal clientele.  She sold at the Falmouth Market in Trelawny, the parish bordering St. Ann. Growing up, my elder brothers and sisters took turns to sell in the market, either with my mother or on their own when she was ill.  I, Miss Coolie's ‘wash-belly’, was never taken to the market.

City boys on their first donkey ride

I often tell my only child, Jared, about my astute mother's juggling act.  There was a point when three of us were attending Primary School at the same time. Unable to afford more, the single pencil my mother bought would be 'cut' in three pieces. We each took turns with the bit that had the eraser. Through this experience, we learned the value of caring for our ‘things’.  We were forbidden from borrowing so we each kept our third of a pencil in a safe place until Friday.  I really looked forward to my Monday morning treat when it was my turn to get the bit of the pencil with the eraser.

Our household was infused with a drive, energy and compelling desire to excel.

Excelling did not mean having cars, a huge house, acres of land as Maas Joe and Miss Daisy. To us, ‘things’ meant enough to provide fuel for the journey along the road to achievement of our life-long ambitions.  Our mother never put us under any pressure to do our school work.  Her repeated chant was instead, ”Pickney, work hard because mi nuh have no legacy fi lef give oonu."  Another perspective on ‘things’. We learnt from an early age that we can only count the cows in our backyard, not anybody else’s.  As Theodore Roosevelt so aptly stated:

“For better is it to dare mighty ‘things’ to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure – than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a grey twilight that know not victory nor defeat”

The welcoming red steps of home

Not too long ago, there was a Facebook post asking those born in the 1960's what was their favourite cartoon. I could not participate in this exercise because:

1. There was no TV in Gibraltar in my childhood and the radio station signed off at 8:00 p.m. due to poor transmission.
2. There was no electricity in my district until the late 1970’s.

The foregoing should have clued you in that my beginnings were humble.

I came to the big city, Kingston, after graduating from High School.  It was an immediate culture shock.  Despite what some might have considered poverty, we never begged. Imagine then my dismay to see people begging to get by.  Now in the Capital City of Kingston for all these years, I have not enrolled in the ‘art of begging’ course.

My first birthday party ever was for my 40^th.  Some of you might say “poor baby” but I never saw that as poverty.  I see those ‘economic limitations’ as a big SO WHAT?!.  I wasn’t deprived.  I was just a normal, average child who grew up in Gibraltar, St. Ann –  never feeling lesser than. 

I must admit that, despite my humble upbringing, I have been railroaded into indulging, bitten by the ‘material bug’.  The challenge we live with today is not trying to provide enough for our children but convincing them that what they have is enough. Things change and not always for the better. 

My primary school surrounded by Maas Joe's lands

There was a definite beauty, simplicity and wonderment to my childhood and Gibraltar. It was a childhood of dreams and imagination than of material expectations.  Cable, TV and video games did not yet exist, so we visited and played in our "pretend world" that we created in our backyards or the not too busy streets. 

It seems we valued things more because there was not a whole lot but we DID have enough. In fact more than enough. Materialism is now the way of being. We venerate conspicuous displays of wealth.  As a people, we need to revisit the fundamental yet ever-so wise truth that there is enough.  More importantly, our children need to be inculcated with a sense of "enoughness" rather than such a sharp focus on accumulating. It is time we go back to basics.

What is your view on this? Share your thoughts with us here or on our Facebook page. You can also follow us on Twitter.

Continue to experience an "Enough" day!

Clara Brown is an Insurance Executive and lives in St. Andrew,  Jamaica with her spouse and only child, Jared. She is one of our regular Guest Authors.