Happy New Year – Part 3

I hope you have enjoyed the exercises and questions over the last few days.  Remember to leverage your learning by sharing your ideas, thoughts and awareness with someone who can help you achieve your goals in 2019.

Please note that if you have not read Part 1 or Part 2 of this series, Part 3 may not make much sense. Please go back and read them now.

Okay, from Friday’s exercise, I hope you have started to create your list of tolerations so that you can zap them on the head!  Yes, some will take more effort and time.  Yet others, like the wallpaper hanging down, the messy car, the unfinished conversations or arguments with others, can be halted as energy-drainers much faster.  You’ll be stunned at just how light you can feel by removing 25% of them!

PART III – LOOKING FORWARD INTO 2019

Now, this is where we get to have a bit more fun!  Why is it more fun? Because we are in creation mode!  2019 is just about to start.  And it is carte blanche, a tabula rasa, waiting for us to draw, design, sketch out and deliberately color in our lives over the coming 12 months.

So, let’s look ahead.

Whoops, don’t want to lose you now!  I’m not actually talking about New Year Resolutions (which many folks will both start and stop in the next few days!).  Sounds counter-intuitive, but making New Year Resolutions is not the best way to have your best year yet!

What I’m referring to, again, is an opportunity to create.

And this is a simple exercise.  It is the sort of exercise that just screams ease, joy, fun, creativity.  Yet it simultaneously lines up our energy to all things positive and possible in the Universe.

Okay, this exercise is a two-parter.

For the first part, you will need those 3 x 5 cards.  Take out your list of tolerations from Friday’s exercise.  For each toleration that you’ve not yet gotten rid of, write it down on a separate card.  Remember, you wanted to remove 25% of these in the past couple of days but if you haven’t done so yet, put those 25% on the top of the pile. For the remaining 75%, I’m going to ask you to commit to zapping one toleration per week throughout 2019.  You may find that you zap a lot more per week, but shoot for at least one!

For the second part of the exercise, you will once again want to find some quiet space to ponder, dream and play.  This is where your imagination gets full permission to take over for a while. I also invite you to give this part of the exercise much more than 15 minutes if you can.

(If you happen to be south of the equator, just flip the following descriptions of the seasons around a bit!)

In this place of quiet and calm, cast your thoughts and energy forward into January and all the month may bring.  Now, move on to February and all the fun you could have.  How about March?  Will you be planning your summer holidays at the same time as relishing the last days of winter?

Now, we’re into April and you can smell spring in the air.  Through May, June and July – those lazy, hazy days of summer.  On into August (oh, the heat!) and September and rolling through autumn into October, November (oh, the cold) and into the joys of Christmas again in December.

Think about the friends you will see, the new adventures you will have, the family visits you will enjoy.  Imagine the feelings of success you will have at work, as you take command of your career and spread your wings even further.

Think of those quiet times that you will be on your own, contemplating and just enjoying who you are.  Sense how you will overcome challenges that appear.  Revel in the growth you will experience as you learn more about yourself and your world.  Feel joy and appreciation right down the tips of your toes for all that 2019 will bring into your life.

Let your imagination roll – it has tremendous power.

Cast your mind forward one year and, pretending it is the end of December 2019, write your answers to the following questions.  For the first 5, use a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 representing “definitely not” and 10 being “definitely yes” along with any additional comments you want to make:-

1.  Have I lived in a way that is consistent with my values in 2019?

2.  Have I taken great care of my mind, body and spirit throughout 2019?

3.  Have I achieved what I set out to achieve in 2019?

4.  Have I been deliberate in my actions?

5.  Have I taken control to move, shape, and design my environment myself?

6.  What worked really well in 2019?

7.  What actions did I take that served others?

8.  What am I most proud of?

9.  When I look back throughout 2019, what makes me smile?

10.  Who entered my life in 2019 that brings me joy?

11.  What did I do that I didn’t think I could do?

Your answers to these 11 questions bring forth your goals, plans, ideas, attitudes and achievements for 2019.

What actions do you need to take right now to be able to answer these questions the way you want this time next year?

What do you need to start doing?  Stop doing?  Do more of?

What’s the plan?

Write it down – make it happen.

If you would like any input, support or the occasional compassionate kick in the butt (or ‘but’ that gets in your way) to get you moving, just let me know! It’s what I’m famous for!

Now, you might be saying to yourself “is that it? Is that all she is giving me in the way of tools or ideas for planning 2019?”

Yes.

Because this is all you actually need!

I’ve been studying what it takes to create success and achievement for over 25 years and one of the things I’ve come across that consistently stops people from getting where they want to go is their unnecessary need to (a) make things complicated and/or (b) look for a huge arsenal of tools, tricks and tips.

All you need you now have!

You have taken stock of 2018 and created a list of annoying things you are putting up with. Believe me, if you get rid of half of those tolerations over the next few weeks, you will create a 2019 that is filled – overflowing – with soooo much success and achievement, you will be running to my door to thank me!

And, as the icing on the cake, by answering questions 6 – 11 above, you will have proactively set your priorities, goals, targets and ambitions for a wonderful New Year.

It does not have to be any more complicated than this!

Just ask the hundreds (maybe thousands?) of people who used this program exactly one year ago!

It’s your turn now. Create 2019 as your best year yet!

Happy New Year – Part 1

Yup, its that time of year again!

2018 is rolling to a close and amidst all the parties, family, friends, shopping, snow and special TV programs, this time of year offers up the perfect opportunity to take stock of the past 12 months, clear away “schtuff” that’s simply hanging around and look forward into 2019.

Starting today with another installment tomorrow and then Monday, we’ll be looking at exactly how you can make 2019 your best year yet (at home or at the office). PS – Feel free to send these posts to your family and friends too.

And if you follow these few simple steps, you’ll get maximum benefit from the exercises I’ll be sharing with you:-

1.  Take time to actually do the exercises! You won’t need to spend any more than 15 minutes on each exercise, though more is perfectly fine if you want.

2.  Write down your answers, thoughts, ideas, inspirations.  Whatever comes to mind.  Don’t just consider it – write it down.

3.  Be honest with yourself.  No one needs to see or hear your replies or thoughts if you don’t want to share them.  But YOU will hear them so be honest, with extra kindness and caring if need be.

4.  Look for the learning.  These are not exercises to provoke self-doubt or guilt but simply tools of learning.

5.  Create actions from the learning.  Share your new awareness with your spouse or partner, hire a coach or ask a trusted friend to help you implement some goals or action steps.

PART I – TAKING STOCK

In a quiet moment today, when you are alone and have a few minutes to yourself, write down your answers to these questions.  Use a scale from 1 to 10, with 1 representing “definitely not” and 10 being “definitely yes” along with any additional comments you want to make:-

1.  Have I lived in a way that is consistent with my values this year?

2.  Have I taken great care of my mind, body and spirit this year?

3.  Have I achieved what I set out to achieve this year?

4.  Have I been deliberate in my actions?

5.  Have I taken control to move, shape, and design my environment myself?

Remember, answer with honesty and without guilt.  “Success” or “failure” is not the issue here.  We are mining for the gold of learning through honesty.

Now, let’s change tack a bit.  Over the years, I’ve found that we human creatures are often pretty poor at recognizing our achievements and celebrating them.  So here are a few questions to help surface up some of that good stuff!

1.  What worked really well in 2018?

2.  What actions did I take that served others?

3.  What am I most proud of?

4.  When I look back throughout 2018, what makes me smile?

5.  Who entered my life in 2018 that brings me joy?

6.  What did I do that I didn’t think I could do?

In tomorrow’s post, I’ll share a tool you can use to get clarity on those things that you are putting up with, and we’ll take steps to get rid of them once and for all!

In the meantime, enjoy the last few days of 2018 as you get ready to ring in a brand new year, full of opportunity, learning and potential!

Take A Look Inside: The Benefits Of Self-Awareness

Self-awareness is the ability to remain in touch with yourself.  It is an understanding of how you think and feel about yourself in different situations. This acquired knowledge about self shapes your decisions and determines your actions and behaviors. Most workers want to understand their motives, conflicts, behaviors, issues, and relationships while at work. Church (1997) maintains that high-performing workers are also highly self-aware and are able to accurately assess and determine their workplace behaviors.

So, take time to do a little introspection and reflect on the following:

  • True understanding of yourself requires effortful introspection (Showry & Manasa, 2014). This process of self-assessment can be cognitively complex, and typically occurs at the unconscious and subconscious levels. Yet, it takes the simple conscious decision to do it to get the ball rolling.
  • Self-aware workers can express both their strengths and their weaknesses. In so doing, self-aware workers know that they can convert weaknesses into strengths by working on self (Showry & Manasa, 2014).
  • Self-aware workers are open to objective feedback (Duval and Lalwani , 1999). When you reject the validity of negative feedback or overlook your faults and failures or take more credit for your group’s work than you give to other members, you are protecting your ego from injury. In turn, this negatively impacts the organization. And while your ego may have been saved from harm, your self-esteem drops.
  • The more you understand yourself, your communication at work (and at home) improves. Improved communication at the workplace will ultimately increase your work performance (Wegner and Giuliano 1982).
  • Finally, the depth of your self-awareness equals your breath of success (Morris, 2016)

Self-aware workers understand who they are and what they want to achieve. Instead of becoming defensive when confronted with hard times, they accept the situation, transform themselves and thrive.

Selected References:

Church, A. (1997). Managerial Self-Awareness in High-Performing Individuals in Organizations, Journal of Applied Psychology, 82(2), 281-292.

Duval, T. & Lalwani, N. (1999). Objective Self-Awareness and Causal Attributions for Self-Standard Discrepancies: Changing Self or Changing Standards of Correctness, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, (25), 1220-1229.

Ickes, W. J., & Knowles, E. S. (1982). Personality, roles, and social behavior. New York: Springer-Verlag.

Morris, N. (2016, February). Metacognitive Skills Training as a Positive Psychology Intervention for Within-Person Fluctuations of Wellbeing at Work presented to University of East London, London, England.

Showry, K., Mendemu, V. & Manasa, L. (2014). Self-Awareness-Key to Effective Leadership. IUP Journal of Soft Skills, 8 (1), 15+.

Wegner, D. & Giuliano, T. (1982). The Forms of Social Awareness. In Personality, roles, and social behavior. New York: Springer-Verlag.

Introduction to The Morris Code book series


In the 25+ years I have been studying the science of psychology in the business world, certain obvious facts have emerged about how to create success in one’s personal and professional life.

First, the word “success” is best defined by the person using it, and nobody else. Unfortunately, people have a tendency to listen to what others say the definition of success ‘should’ be. This leads us to chase our tail, trying to achieve their success when ours is actually so much different. This also explains why some people struggle to follow the guidance of so-called gurus – it’s their success, not our own.

Second, uncovering our definition of success can be difficult. Our inner voice is often drowned out by noise in our head. You know what I’m talking about – the noise that whispers in your ear that you’re not capable, you should be doing something else, you aren’t good enough, you’re making mistakes, nothing ever goes right, someone will discover you don’t know what you’re doing and all the other BS that blocks you.

When you combine external noise with internal noise, it’s no wonder you can’t hear yourself think!

My fundamental belief is quite simple, and it is this – the depth of your self-awareness equals the breadth of your success, however you choose to define it. This holds true for life in general but also for different areas in your life. For example, your definition of success in a personal relationship is probably different than your definition of success in a business relationship. And the success you define for yourself in your 20’s is very likely to be different in your 40’s.

So the degree to which you know yourself is the degree to which you can create the opportunities and make the choices and decisions that will take you where you want to go. This premise is not new, but it flies in the face of many of the books, articles, videos, seminars, workshops, life and business coaches, and other resources that are out there. This isn’t to say that there is no value in these resources; but every great solution requires a problem and even if the problem doesn’t really exist, you can bet that somebody will create it anyway!

The Morris Code book series helps you deepen your self-awareness. The Morris Code is a set of simple attitudes and actions I have learned over the years to be the most effective in helping someone define their own success. Understanding The Morris Code helps reduce that internal, unhelpful noise so that you can deepen your own self-awareness.

In a nutshell, The Morris Code is:
1.    Use procrastination to your advantage by understanding what it truly is.
2.    Stop shoulding on yourself and others.
3.    Pursue performance goals persistently and consistently.
4.    Have more want-tos in your day than have-tos.
5.    Personify integrity – say what you mean and mean what you say.
6.    Live in your sense of source, whatever that is.

This first book in the series explores procrastination from a new, science-based approach. Plus, there are dozens of ideas for increasing your productivity and work performance by rethinking “time management”.

We tend to have a lot of internal conversations about our work and whether we think we are effectively contributing to a greater good. Our workplace is also the base for many social relationships. These factors play in to our self-esteem and confidence, making the workplace an ideal place to start in a journey of self-awareness. 

Anchoring Your Success

Attitude – I asked the audience at a recent business meeting how many of them had created a clear, written definition of success for their business or career. Less than 25% of them raised their hand. When I probed a bit further with a few of them, what I found was that they tended to be using the stereotypical definitions of success, such as lots of money or a big house, usually posited by other so-called successful people.

Of course, borrowing a definition from someone else until you figure out your own is fine. In fact, I recommend you borrow mine until you have taken some time to work one out for yourself.

However, holding on to someone else’s determination of success without truly seeing if and how it fits in with your integrity is likely to create all sorts of square pegs in round holes for you.

You see, your personal definition of success will anchor your actions and give you a point of reference. Not having a point of reference that comes from within you may be behind some of the overwhelm and overload you feel.

So, here’s my definition –

I feel successful when I have more want-to’s in my day than have-to’s.

You’ll notice a couple of important things about that definition.

First, I talk of success as a feeling, not a possession. Thoughts and feelings drive our behaviour, and they need to form the basis of our performance goals, which ultimately creates our success.

Second, I mention nothing about money, relationships, position or status. When my days are filled with want to’s, I know I’ve made choices based on my personal and professional integrity about who I spend time with and how. I make those choices fully accepting responsibility for what happens and then my days naturally fill with want-to’s.

And guess what? Those days usually lead to the more common definitions of success about money, people and position.

Action – If you don’t have a written definition of what success feels like to you, start with mine. Then, over the next few days, ask yourself how you really want to feel as that successful person. Then also ask yourself to what extent you already are successful (because you are) and how you feel about that.

As you understand what success feels like for you, you make it more possible to achieve.

Further reading:
On performance goals – here and here
​​​​​​​On success – here
Another definition of success – here

Privacy Settings
We use cookies to enhance your experience while using our website. If you are using our Services via a browser you can restrict, block or remove cookies through your web browser settings. We also use content and scripts from third parties that may use tracking technologies. You can selectively provide your consent below to allow such third party embeds. For complete information about the cookies we use, data we collect and how we process them, please check our Privacy Policy
Youtube
Consent to display content from Youtube
Vimeo
Consent to display content from Vimeo
Google Maps
Consent to display content from Google
Save