Monday, May 8, 2017

IN THE BALANCE: Lifestyle Balance



Did you know that you are already a great juggler? Even while sleeping, you can breathe, restore cells, beat your heart, fight off illnesses and digest food. While awake, many times we can find ourselves driving, talking, changing music and eating at the same time. We are amazing multi-taskers, and the reason we often forget that we are is because we’re so good at it. Well, transitioning into the entrepreneur's lifestyle is going to require that you remember how to do that, because like the talented juggler who can rotate ten objects at once, introducing just one more object can interrupt her rhythm and cause her to drop everything. Almost every new entrepreneur can relate to this kind of crash. Raise your hand. Those who remain in failure are those who do not pick up the pieces and learn a new rotation, a new rhythm which includes this one more additional item. It is challenging, but doable. Think not? Talk to any veteran Marine, and they will tell you about how much they do before 9AM than most people do all day. Perhaps bootcamp may be just the thing to teach you how to expand the juggling talents you already have to include your entrepreneurial responsibilities in addition to the ones you are carrying now.

Most people will not be able to immediately quit their full time job to go into building their business full time. Many will have to build part-time while maintaining a full-time job to cover their sustenance and handle parental responsibilities, stay fit, pay the bills, keep the house clean, the lover happy and friends engaged, and maybe even going to school to work on that next degree while trying to have some fun every now and again, you name it, phew!
You’ve probably been singing that jingle, “Ain’t nobody got time for that!” Again, it is challenging, if not at least initially, but it is done all the time and it is not beyond you. Do not allow yourself to use what you are juggling now as an excuse not to actualize your gifts in exchange for wealth and freedom. What could be more important? It could be the very reason you are in this earth plane existence in the first place.

So, if you’ve already experienced a disruption in your current rotation and rhythm and have dropped everything and crashed, sometimes that is the best thing that can happen in order to put things back together again the way they should be and discard the parts of your lifestyle which have no business being in there and is what is not making room for your business.

I have an older brother ten years ahead of me. I remember him teaching me how to clean our room once I got old enough to help. He made it fun by telling me to completely mess the room up. Whatever was not bolted down or fragile and was in disarray on the dressers got swiped to the floor. We then walked through what looked like a demolition scene with a trash bag. Whatever we picked up that we could not figure out a good use for had to go in the trash. After your disaster, you may have to do this with your life. Some call it purging. If you are carrying a responsibility that is not making you money, saving you time, improving your health, giving you energy or sustaining your basic necessities of yourself and your dependents, put it in the trash if it causing you not to have time, energy, money and focus for your business.

What you are left with, begin to stack your foundation appropriately. You dropped everything because you were knocked off balance. Whenever you are out of balance, always go back to your foundation, the fundamentals and build from there. When it comes to the fundamentals, you always hear about mind, body, and spirit, but what order do they go in? That order is spirit, mind, then body.


SPIRIT

Beginning with committing to your first responsibilities, you need to have inner peace and you need love for your spiritual well-being. You should be conscious of a universal and intelligent power that is greater than yourself and to feel your connectedness with it and bring yourself into alignment with its ways you can observe directly in nature, and that is empirically love and justice. Consciously connecting with and aligning with this power is the only route to true inner peace. It will also give you the power to love on a supernatural level, and the love you receive back are the true riches of life. Going to church or bible study may not be the most effective way for you to get this done. There are other ways to get this done, which might be more effective and can be done in less time. Simply ask yourself these questions?:

“Do I feel loving, grateful and appreciative for everything that I have?”

“Is my conscience clear?”

“Am I not afraid of death?”

Any no to these questions indicates spiritual unease or disease. If you’ve been using religion with its churches and bible studies and you’ve been in chronic spiritual disease more often than not, and you’ve been contributing your tithes and time to these services, it is time to try something else. It may be contributing to your spiritual disease itself. Put it in the trash.

Prayer:
Try journaling your prayers, simply writing letters to this universal intelligent power of which you are a part. Write your letters in the evening before bed and read your letters from one year prior in the morning. When you begin, if all you can go back is a day, do that until you can go back one week, until you can go back one month until you can go back one year. Quarterly, roll back even further: January 1st- 3 years, April 1st- 5 years, July 1st- 7 years, October 1st-10 years. Always begin your letters with praise and gratitude before you ask a question about what the next right move should be for you in the coming day. Ask empowering questions like:

“What’s trying to emerge in my life?”

“What gifts do I have to give?”

“How much power can flow through me?”

“What is the vision for my life?”

“What is the universe seeking to express through me?”

“What is the idea that the universe is trying make as my life?”

“What is the universe up to as my life?”

“What must I become to manifest the vision that I am beginning to see?”

“Where must I grow?”

“What must I unfold?”

“What habits must change?”

“What thought patterns must dissolve?”

“What events are challenging me to become this?”

“What lessons are there for me to learn?”

“What would love do?”

Make these questions apply to the content of your life and try to focus on just one question at a time. Behind every problem or event that you do not yet understand its purpose or cause, there is a question trying to ask itself. Behind every question, there is an answer trying to be revealed. Behind every answer, there is an action trying to be taken. Behind every action, there is a way of life trying to be born. Be inquisitive about every step of the process and beg for understanding and insight. You should ask in faith that all things are working together for your good. You should then only be concerned about being aware of what your part should be in this creative process. The answers may come to you in your dreams that evening, or a sign may show up over the next coming days that you will readily recognize because you have asked with intent. When you are given an inspired action to take, say YES! and act on it immediately without delay. The universal presence can only do for you what it can do through you. When you say YES and trust and honor it with immediate and confident action, that is when power happens, by giving it permission and opening yourself as a clear access point for its benevolent intentions. Reviewing your letters and comparing them with the present should strengthen your faith by allowing you to see and be conscious of how this universal power has been working within your life and responding to your questions as if it is alive and conscious, because indeed it is.

Meditation:
If your life is a hurricane, you need to find the eye and take a seat there to reset your energies at least once a day and preferably three. You can accompany meditation with every meal you eat with 15 minutes of stillness. I happen to burn white sage and lavender incense and will remain in meditation until they have burned to completion while drinking tea after breakfast and then after dinner. I even have a collection of calming instrumentals I use to lower my heart rate and slow my mental activity and aid me as I go into stillness and silence. ( Satygraha Prayer For Peace Playlist ) Enjoy! Create your own ritual for going into stillness. While in stillness, suspend thought about anything outside of your present space and moment. Breathe and observe your environment without thinking about it. Start with deep conscious breaths and then move your consciousness toward your heartbeat and then expand your observations outward. When starting this practice, it would be best to begin with quiet and calming spaces where you can focus. Nature is always best when weather and proximity to natural and quiet open spaces permit. As your power to focus increases, you will be able to meditate in the middle of pandemonium without raising your heart rate a beat.

Fasting:
To purify and transmute your spiritual power, it will be important to detach yourself from addictions, which is any compulsive activity done out of proportion to other activities that then throws you out of balance and in detriment with other necessary activities. Though you may know it is harming your health and robbing you of important time and maybe even money, energy or relationships, it is difficult to stop because there is something within you which craves it and at the root of it is spiritual pain and inadequacy. That inadequacy or sore spot creates a vacuum which is often only temporarily plugged with addictions: smoking, drinking, eating out of proportion, sleeping out of proportion, sexing out of proportion, spending, shopping and gathering out of proportion, gambling and risking out of proportion, attention seeking out of proportion, addictions to drama and violence. You should never guilt yourself for having an addiction. Self judgement serves no good purpose. What is important is for you to acknowledge that you have any of these addictions and know that they are not good for you and then begin seeking help, help to resolve the pain or inadequacy which is causing the vacuum and thus the addiction which never fulfills the vacuum. It is like eating food that somehow disappears in your throat and never reaches your stomach and so you never get full and satisfied. Addictions are exactly that, spiritual parasites and they drain your spiritual power.

The goal of fasting is temperance. Fasting allows you to put space and distance between you and this addiction for a period of time to break its hold on you. It is in essence starving the parasite to death and regaining the spiritual power it has been draining from you. If it is food, you go down to the bare necessities you may have for food. In this, most people can safely go without food for 3 days so long as you keep yourself adequately hydrated. As always consult your physician. If your addiction is sleep, work on something productive, engaging and passionate for 24 hours straight. Anyone can go for 40 days without sex or masturbation. Beyond bills, anyone can take their spending allowance down to $1 a day for 40 days. If attention is your addiction, go into isolation for at least a week.

Fasting should be done quarterly and dealing with just one addiction at a time. If you can not manage to complete the fast on your own will or with the help of an accountability partner, seek outside help. However, before you venture beyond your powers, be sure that you have connected with universal power and intelligence to aid you in your break from the addiction. It will be most important for you to pray and meditate throughout a fast. Pray for spiritual strength and it will be provided to you. Meditation will give you the awareness to allow you to see the addiction grabbing at you before it has a chance to take over your subconscious mind in an effort to survive and thus lessening its effect. Always start with the easiest addictions to break first to build your spiritual strength to begin progressively challenging the tougher, more deep-seated addictions. Each time you kill an addiction, it releases spiritual power it has held hostage you can then use for the next challenge. Most addictions will take 40 days to make a clean break from and the first 10 days will be the toughest.

Service:
No one came into this planet as a victim. Everyone came bearing gifts. It will then be important to give those gifts away and touch lives. It is why you are here. If your business is an avenue by which you serve your gifts, then 10% of your time, services and money should be dedicated in love to aid those who could benefit most from your gifts and can not afford to pay for them. This is your love offering. Engage with those you are helping with humility and learn about how your services are making a difference in their lives. Imagine yourself as them and then do whatever you are then inspired to do and would want done if the roles were reversed. This will increase your love muscle and the power of love and meaningful purpose for your work, you will find will be one of the most powerful forces at your disposal. It will keep you going and revive you when without it you would have given up 100 miles ago. When you touch lives, you will find your own life touched. It is in the giving and receiving of love that awakens your spirit, the GIANT within. When you give love from the truthful core of your spirit, this is what causes the world to fall in love with you and happiness is the result of when your needs to give love and receive love are met. What is that worth?


MIND

Free your mind and the rest will follow! The well-being of your psychology and intellect fall under the realm of mind.

Psychology:
Your psychology is how you interpret what is happening and the meanings your apply to it in relation to yourself. Unhealthy psychologies are superiority complexes, inferiority complexes, entitlement mentalities, victim mindsets, combativeness, siege mentalities, paranoia, anxiety, depression, feelings of inadequacy. Your psychology are these modes of thought and the feelings they produce. If I told you I’m taking you on an all expense-paid trip to Hawaii this weekend and you believed me, how would you feel? The thought of Hawaii has just produced that feeling, and the feeling is chemical. These chemicals can either be a healing balm to your body and brain or corrosive to your physical health, bringing on a wide array of diseases including hypertension, indigestion, ulcers and cancers. What’s most astonishing is that most times those interpretations are not rooted in facts, but are the fictional products of associative memory that try to help you anticipate the future based upon past experiences to help you avoid danger and pain but often get it wrong. How often do we make assumptions, prejudiced and biased conclusions and learn later how incorrect they were? Meanwhile, those thoughts created feelings that were probably unnecessary. Do you know of anyone who wants love but avoids it because of fear produced in association with a past hurt? For them, Love, while it might feel good is also associated with pain and weakness for them. Raise your hand if I have just talked about you. How we think almost directly influences how we respond to what happens in our lives, which has dramatic implications over the trajectory of our lives. Your thoughts of inadequacy could rob you of courage to make that sale or talk to that person who could be your soul mate causing you to miss a golden opportunity set up for you. It happens all the time. If your thoughts are producing fear, it is probably more often than not going to produce bad choices as well and thus bad results and a more challenging life trajectory. Many of our thought modes or attitudes were conditioned in us within our formative years by the time we were age 6 and most people never question, examine or challenge them for the duration of their lives and so their mind dictates how much money they are going to make, their health, who they will marry if at all and perhaps how long they will live and how they will die.

The field of Psychology deals with examining and understanding these attitudes and thought modes. Psychiatry deals with medically treating psychological disorders brought on by chemically based corrosive feelings which are produced by these thoughts and whereas the dissonance between reality and experience is significant to the extent that an individual can not function independently, such as in the case of Schizophrenia.

It may help to begin seeking therapy to aid you in examining, understanding and undoing some of these limiting thought modes, especially if you have not yet made peace with a past traumatic experience which continues to haunt you . I highly recommend it. Motivational seminars are also a great investment. Also, be careful of the messages of the music you listen to and the television programs you watch and how they make you feel, for they speak volumes to your subconscious mind. But for now, adopt these new more healthy and true thought modes and find music and entertainment which rhymes with these. Recite them with repetition until you accept them as your truth and reality:

“The universe bears no ill to me, I bear no ill to it.”

“And we know that all things work together for the good of those who love...and are influenced and inspired by its purposes.” -Romans 8:28

“Before I formed you in your mother’s womb I knew you. Before you were born, I consecrated you.” 
-Jeremiah 1:5

“For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this.” -Esther 4:14

“Jesus answered them, ‘Is it not written in your own law, ‘I have said you are gods’?” 
-John 10:34

“I said ‘You are gods, you are all sons of the Most High.” -Psalm 82:6


Intelligence:

Intelligence is awareness and understanding, to see and know what you are looking at. Intelligence brings enlightenment. Enlightenment eradicates ignorance and its resulting fears just like turning on the lights and the bogeyman disappears into its actual object. Bringing intelligence to your psychological framework so that you can reconfigure it to a more healthy pattern is internal intelligence, which includes emotional intelligence. Bringing intelligence to the framework of the society in which you live and understanding its trajectory and the forces of the universe within which you are having your being is external intelligence. Wherever that enlightenment can eliminate ignorance and fear in your mind, the better for you.

You will not have the opportunity to know all there is to know in this lifetime, but seek as much knowledge as you can get and make a habit out of thinking and making connections between seemingly disconnected pieces of knowledge to expand your awareness. Everything is connected. Engage in discussions with other great thinkers and share your knowledge. To be living within the information age with a vast wealth of knowledge unprecedented on just about any subject at our fingertips almost entirely removes any excuse for anyone to be ignorant. Especially if it frightens you, seek to understand it. As you learn and understand new things, you’ll be enticed to seek more knowledge, and this unquenched curiosity is an indicator of a healthy intellect. Never consider that you know everything. As you understand things better, it changes how you think, the choices you make because more options come into view and thus your entire life can be shifted with an expanded and active intellect.

To make feeding your intellect a part of your healthy lifestyle, “Read, read, read, never stop reading, and when you can’t read anymore, write.” -James Baldwin. If it is not providing you with new information that you can use or helping you understand your world better or cause you to think or stimulate your creative imagination over ‘what if?’, put it down. It is a waste of your time and attention. The same rule can be applied to any television programs you may decided to watch. What are you learning? Seeing things in perspective, old fears will be transformed into humor and wit which is also another sign of a healthy intellect.


BODY

So now in your balanced lifestyle regimen, you’re building your foundation by journaling your prayers in the evening, reviewing them in the morning, you’re meditating after each meal, you’re fasting quarterly, you’re serving weekly, you’re seeking therapy and motivation, reciting positive affirmations and listening to uplifting music and always have a good book in hand. What’s next? Your earthship, which is the body you see in the mirror. To be effective at the work you will be taking on, you must keep it in top shape. You may have heard of some of these tips before, but to balance, you must now make them a rule for your life:
  1. Sleep 8 hours per day in a dark and quiet room. TV off!
  2. Drink 8 glasses of water per day.
  3. Eat a balanced plant based diet.
  4. Exercise: 4 aerobic sessions per week, 3 strength training sessions per week, flexibility and stretching daily.
That’s it! Sleep, drink, eat and exercise. How to do that most effectively, I will not go into extensive detail here for concern of making this blecture much too long. Therefore, I am suggesting you google it, visit the library, talk to your doctor, your fitness trainer or a dietician.


FOUR

4 is the number of balance like 4 seasons, 4 elements, 4 directions, 4 legs to a table, 4 limbs, 4 wheels to a car. Now I am outlining 4 practices to make up the foundation of your balanced lifestyle, which is Spirit, Mind and Body:

SPIRIT:
  1. Pray
  2. Meditate
  3. Fast
  4. Serve

MIND:
  1. Affirmations
  2. Positive Input (Music, Television)
  3. Therapy & Motivational Seminars
  4. Reading

BODY:
  1. Sleep
  2. Drink
  3. Eat
  4. Exercise

LAYERING

Once you have these practices as the core of your life as your first responsibilities to yourself, you can begin adding on one responsibility at a time, starting with how you provide for your current sustenance, which may be your job. Your next responsibilities are to your immediate household family, the children or any dependents and the spouse or life partner. Get as much assistance with this as you can. While it is important for you to own these responsibilities, you can not afford to allow it to overwhelm your life. Those members of your family who are more independent or can be, must be given limits on their need of you. Just like they can be of great assistance to you in the navigation of your life through sporadic illnesses and money challenges, be there as an assistant to them, but they must take up ownership of responsibilities of themselves if they can. These exceptions would be children age 6 and under and mobility handicapped members of your family. If you can afford to hire a nanny or caretaker, do so, or share these responsibilities with someone else like a spouse or older children in the caretaking of children, or siblings in the caretaking of elderly parents. Do not try to carry the full weight of another human being on your own if you do not have to.

After you have fulfilled your responsibilities to yourself, to your job and to your household family, if you have one, your next responsibility is to your business. Your business is where your wealth and freedom for the future lies. Friends and extended family do not get to interfere with that.

Stop there. Do not add anything else to your plate until you are proficiently juggling these responsibilities with ease for at least 90 days of MASTERY.

When you are ready to begin adding to the mix, add them one at a time per 90 days. The moment it begins to interfere with your responsibilities to yourself, your job, your family or your business, set it down.

The criteria the added responsibility must pass is:
  • Will it make you money?
  • Will it save you time?
  • Is it good for your health in (Spirit, Mind, Body)? Social health can be included in this.
A yes to any of these is a license to go ahead and try it.

Including fun, recreational and entertainment based activities into your lifestyle which will connect you with others is important, but only after you have mastered the basics. Until then, engage in them sporadically, or at least once a quarter.

The next layer of responsibilities you have are to your extended relations which include adult siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, grandparents and best friends. These are those with whom you have a personal relationship. It will be important for you to differentiate between the healthy relationships and unhealthy relationships. In healthy relationships, both parties mutually support one another, help each other grow, heal and add the riches of love to each other’s lives. In unhealthy relationships, there is codependency, abuse, lies, manipulation, distrust, disingenuousness, one or both parties diminishes the other, they stifle each other’s progress, there is jealousy, usury and one or both parties drain the resources of time, money and energy from one another with negative returns on investment. Do yourself a mighty favor and disengage from all unhealthy relationships without even the need of an explanation. You don’t have time for unhealthy relationships, simply put. You are not going to fix them or make them better by continuing to engage in them. Remove yourself at once and if the relationship has any hope, the other party will after some time reach out to you reformed and you will recognize the change. Until then, save that time and energy and devote it to nurturing your healthy relationships. Holidays and birthdays are excellent times to visit with these special people in your life, but instead of taking time out to spend with them, find creative ways to involve and include them in your life in connection with your spiritual work, mental work, body work, your job, your family, or your business or figure out how to get involved in their lives. You can also put them on a list and set up a regular time like Sundays at 5PM to check-in with someone on your list.

Your last responsibility, which must be taken up at some point is your responsibility to you community, which includes many people you may not have a personal relationship with. This includes your neighborhood, your city, your state, your nation and the global community. This can also include your cultural and ethnic community, a faith community, or a professional community or a hobby/interest/lifestyle community. You may belong to expansive social networks and clubs with members you have a shared identity with as members of such organization or club, like fraternities, sororities, a university alumni, a workplace, a church, mosque or synagogue. These are all your communities. By raising a healthy and strong business, you will be already doing a great deal to fulfill your place in your communities with the provisioning of services, goods, employment, and tax revenue. Your business may even allow you to engage in philanthropic services.

To bring this full circle as you see, your ability to handle each level is supported and empowered by your mastery of the level beneath it. When stacked properly, each successive level actually becomes easier to manage when things are in order and you get to enjoy the richness that is your life and it will not be draining. By building a strong and balanced foundation, you are able to bring your best self into the workplace and do your best work. When you do that, you can earn the best that you are capable of earning right now. Earning the best that you are able to right now will help you fill your place within your family or support initial resources to your launch your business. Being financially independent through your business can allow you to have more time with friends and extended family. Doing all these things than automatically serves your communities in many ways. This is why order and balance is so important.


MULTITASKING


The outlook of tending to all of this may seem overwhelming to you. Don’t be. There are many opportunities to tend to multiple matters simultaneously like juggling. You can do community service with your family and friends and be serving your community at the same time. This serves your spiritual, family, social and community responsibilities all on the same clock. You don’t need to go to the gym to exercise. You can join a community sports league and serve your body needs, your social needs, your needs for recreation and community without spending any extra time. You can join a book club or a support group and take care of your social and mental needs at the same time. If Bible study is helpful to you, that’s 4 for 1: spiritual, social, mental, and community. My point is, there is enough time for everything that is important, if you are creative, resourceful and organized. When you redesign your life, keep a log of what points you are hitting with each activity.


MAINTENANCE

Expect that after the end of each quarter, 90 days, your new organized and structured lifestyle is going to wear and if you are conscious, you will begin to feel the imbalance with lethargy, mental fog and a slacking in your rituals. It happens to the best of us, especially in the beginning. Don’t judge yourself. No one is perfect. Even though these are my aims, to be honest, on my best days I hit the mark about 80% on the regular, but I keep trying and I do get better at it and I am seeing the results. In the meantime, I am patient with myself as I grow, which is a process that is likely to take years. You ought to do likewise. Balancing your life as herein prescribed is no quick and easy fix for your life. However, if you stick to it and get up every time you fall down, you will begin to stand more than you fall just like learning the balance necessary to walk. Give yourself some time, at least 7 years, and your life will have to be dramatically different than it is now by law. I guarantee it. Believe it. Just like after every 12,000 miles you should take your car in for a realignment, you will need to bring your life in for a realignment at least once a quarter. These are what quarterly retreats or vacations or for, to take a break from your grind, breathe, decompress and reset your life or begin to change directions as you may begin moving into new seasons in your life. When you do, give your life a checkup in all of the layers I have outlined. Reset your schedule and then return to your refreshed, realigned and maybe altered balance for your life. Now go live your life...balanced!

This has been another preparatory lesson for those who want to get ready to tackle their business vision head on with The Baldwin Business Institute thebaldwinbusinessinstitute.eventbrite.com  and want to get entrepreneurially fit to maximize their results for these lessons that will not be covered in class. Summer Class starts, Saturday, June 24th. Registration deadline is June 10th. There is a 10 student limit. Don't procrastinate.

Don't yet believe in the power of balance? Learn about what happened when the wolves, a key predator to the ecosystem at Yellowstone National Park were reintroduced after 70 years of absence. If balance can do that for a nearly 3500 sq mile national park, larger than the states of Rhode Island and Delaware combined, imagine what it could do for your life. At a point, it will feel like everything falling into place.



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