Friday list #2: a chipmunk called me fat

Fridays are for seeing what I’ve learned noticed this week.

Because noticing is important.

(This is a total rip-off of my take on Havi’s Friday Chicken.)

Conflict-y noticings

~ Getting less certain gives me beeeg realisations

Whenever I’ve got stressed about something this week, I’ve ‘gone inside’ and checked if I could be less certain about it.

The results have been extraordinary.

For example, for years I’ve been beating myself up about being pretty tired when I get back from lunch on the presentation skills class we run. I normally down a huge coffee after lunch and do a bit of psyching to get myself up to teach at what I thought of as the ‘right’ level of energy.

Result: 2pm-4pm = stress-y beating-self-up time.

I decided to check if I could be less certain about what my level of energy ‘should’ be and that maybe the participants might still be able to carry on transforming themselves without my energy driving them.

Turns out, this post-lunch energy level beat-up was totally about me, and nothing to do with the people we work with.

Turns out, my external energy, as it were (the amount of focus I can place on our delegates, the words I say and their impact) is unaffected by whether I am at an intense level of ‘up’ or not.

Huh.

Result the first: afternoons are much more peaceful for me, and just as productive (if not more) for the participants.

Result the second: I just ran Day One of the class (I’m writing this in the cab on the way home) and apparently I’ve applied that lesson to the whole day and I still feel ready for Sue’s spaghetti bolognaise (thanks Sue!) rather than totally wiped out like I normally am.

Double huh.

Intense spiritual inner-part: nil.
Chilled-out happy-go-lucky Yoda inner-part: 2.

~ Other things I got less certain about this week:

I won’t be able to run two blogs.
I should be reading more blogs and commenting on them.
I should have a niche.
I should have a target market.
A niche and a target market are difficult and stress-y to find.
My class depends on me holding people out of their shit and driving them towards realisations with my energy. For two whole days.
I should be more [insert adjective here] in my meditation.

I’ve been teaching people to open for years

When I teach people to talk to groups, what I really want them to do is to be awake to the real people in front of them, not resist reality, and navigate and change by seeing the flows that already exist.

Sounds like Opening to me.

Other people I respect are talking this week about getting less certain

Here and here.

Identifying the part that holds the belief helps me to get less certain

Por ejemplo, the part that thinks I’m not doing enough fast enough has no concept of how things really get done. Things really get done by gradual, almost unnoticed effort, not all-out, huge bucket-filling drama.

By realising this, I am less impressed when that part tries to get me to do 100 times more than I am doing.

I just nod and smile, and quietly carry on not doing enough.

My projects: more like growing trees than building skyscrapers.

In-other-news noticings

Breakfast is my most fixed meal

Despite being at an beautiful Asian buffet, what I really want is yogurt, cereal, toast and juice.

Heathen.

I can use anything for motivation

We went to Disneyland Hong Kong on Sunday (what?)

I met Chip and Dale, the mischievous chipmunks.

Chip called me fat (in silent Disney character talk.)

This has increased my determination to carry on my walking regime.

***

That is all.

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