exercise - Is Your Map The Right Map?

Is Your Map The Right Map?

by Ian Crossley

It always amazes me that school curriculum does nothing to prepare children for the real world, they know how the atom is split, they learn how to calculate mathematical problems to 1000 decimal points, they know what year Captain Cook arrived in Australia, and they have also got a mindful of other trivia, but none of them have been taught about credit ratings, or bank accounts, or the value of a job[ any job] or how a mortgage works, or a myriad of other things, that could help to equip them for that entry into an adult life. The only guidance they have had, is to observe Mum and Dad on the TREADMILL and unfortunately, they are usually too tired to do anything by the time the kids get home. Once again this is not a criticism, it is an observation and until we step aside from the TREADMILL, for a few seconds and really appraise what is going on, things will not change. IF YOU KEEP DOING THE SAME THING NOTHING WILL CHANGE. Our day to day lives, are steered by our short term vision, everything we do must be thought about first, everything that is made, is the result of someones thoughts. If we do not have a CLEAR vision we cannot hope to get things done, it would be like trying to find your way around PERTH with a map of SYDNEY, you could argue that youv'e got a map but we all know its useless unless it applies to where you are.

The secret here, is that you PLAN a VISION. Think of what you really want in life, not just lots of money and laying on the beach, I think at times we all DREAM of that, but something that you truly DESIRE, something, or some situation that you would do anything to achieve. I am in no way religious, but I know certain phrases from the bible to be true, SEEK AND YOU WILL FIND, KNOCK AND THE DOOR WILL OPEN, AS YE SOW SO SHALL YOU REAP, These are all pieces of advice that have been taught to people for thousands of years, but we have not realised or appreciated their value or the real power behind them.

I know that if you have a vision and that vision is strong enough and you are prepared to do whatever is necessary to obtain it, there is NOTHING that you cannot achieve. The biggest problem for most people, is working out exactly what they want, its like going into a clothing store and saying

bring me some clothes, you would have to be much more specific, to get things you wanted and liked. That is the same with your vision you must be SPECIFIC. This may sound a bit off the wall, but I believe that there is some power out there that controls what’s going on, and you can call it what you like, I actually call it the FORMLESS SUBSTANCE. We seem to accept live pictures from any where in the world, we accept phones that take photos and send them over the internet to remote places, we accept so many phenomenal things, yet we have trouble accepting the power of the brain that invented all these things.

The reason that we have to be absolutely specific in our vision, is that if we start going towards it and we are slightly off course, we will never get there. Imagine a journey where at the start you were only 1 degree off course, every step of the journey you would be further from your destination, that is why we have to keep checking that we are still on course. I have found that the biggest enemy is habit and it is always easy, while you are reading something to say, I will do this or that, but we all know that our set habits always have strong affect on what we do. I suggest that until you have actually in your mind found a vision that you truly desire you do not attempt to change your circumstances.

So many people want something for nothing, a classic example of not putting in the effort occured recently when I was on holiday. I saw a man demonstrating a magic trick with four rings and I was mesmerised to the point, that I went back and bought the trick, he told me it was easy and after I had bought it, he showed me how to do the trick. Of course he made it LOOK EASY and it really looked simple the way he showed me, but to do it, so that it appeared to look as good as I had seen it demonstrated, was going to take a lot of practice. I played half heartedly with it for about an hour and after a while it went into the too hard basket. Now can I say that the trick did not work? NO I was TOO LAZY or not interested enough to make it work. That is the same with any information that you may get regards to changing your circumstances, if you are not prepared to do the practice and discipline involved there is only one

person to blame if you do not get any thing out.

As we have repeatedly mentioned life on the treadmill can be very tiring and stressful, one thing that we can all do to de-stress our lives, is to put all things into perspective. We are all guilty of worrying about things that have not yet happened, we tend to create a situation in our mind, that becomes all consuming, we start imagining what MIGHT happen IF, this thing transpires, and this negative thought attracts more negative thought until we are totally stressed out. You try to put these thoughts to the back of your head and the slightest thing, brings them back and you continue to turn your self inside out. Then guess what? in most cases your dreamed up scenario does not happen, things turn out totally different and you feel so relieved, but you have lived with the stress and fear for all that time. The pain and anguish you went through was for nothing, you had imagined a situation and tried to solve it, although it did not actually exist. Surely we have better things to do than to solve problems that are only in our mind. Can you see a pattern evolving here? If we don't have useless information to file in our minds[via the media] and we don't continually try and solve problems that don't exist, we have created time and space to concentrate on some more pleasant things. So the next thing to learn and memorise is SOLVE THE PROBLEM WHEN IT APPEARS NOT WHEN IT IS IN MY MIND. Obviously you cannot be irresponsible and not plan things, but basically just practice putting imagined situations and pre guessing what someone might do, right out of your mind. By doing this you will still have things to solve, but at least your energies will be used only in solving a problem that actually exists. This exercise was the first thing that I actually mastered when I started to try and de-stress my life.

Croz is a motivational speaker and personal mentor. He does a lot of mentoring via the internet. He is the developer of the DE- STRESS FOR SUCCESS programme. Also he has devised a programme to get people into a calm state of mind, called WORRY FREE ISLAND. For details of these programmes and more info, go to http://www.croz.com.au

Is Your Map The Right Map?

by Ian Crossley

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