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http://www.breakthrough-hq.com/goal-setting/reticular-activating-system Ever noticed what happens when you want to buy a particular thing or know someone who has one - a car, maybe an Audi, or a designer handbag? You begin to see them everywhere? So much so you wonder if the dealer has a giveaway on that you've missed. Or perhaps you are thinking about going on holiday - Antarctica - then BAM on TV there is a deluge of doco's on the destination. The travel section of the weekend paper is featuring the wonders of the southern realm. Your kids class starts a learning module on it. And you sit next to a geotech engineer just back from working the summer down there on the bus. Why is it that when we focus our attention to something all around us the cues and clues seem to become more abundant? Answer your R.A.S has been activated ... Your reticular activation system is a part of your brain stem which acts like a radar. See the link under the picture above for a great article from Breakthrough-hq on how the R.A.S works and how it can support you in goal setting. Activating your own R.A.S. deliberately is a powerful tool for motivation and for learning. Focus yourself on something that you would like to learn more about and let the universe deliver the goods. Tune your radar in to healthy eating and lifestyle choices and you'll begin to notice all the wonderful supportive ways you can nurture yourself and your wellbeing. You'll participate in a friends healthy living research, you'll find wild berries when you walk. You choose fish over fondue off the menu, a herb tea over a coffee in the morning. Don't like something or someone. Turn your R.A.S off. Start to go other places and notice other things. Hide them in your Facebook newsfeed or unfriend them. Change the channel. The R.A.S. is the portal between the outside world and it's signals. And YOU - the living, breathing, acting power house and what you do with that information. Learn how to effectively and efficiently open and shut that door. With the ADRENALEARN natural learning framework that I use in DO Learning workshops we activate the R.A.S. to the topics and content of the session and build links and bridges to your real world experiences to ensure that the learning will continue once you re-join real time. How can you turn it on? Turn it up or tune it out? D.A.R.E is my model for change. Decide: what it is that you want to be different. Pick just one thing that you would like more off or less of in your life. I generally find it useful to focus on the things I want to increase and to play the zero tolerance for negatives game. Instead of saying I want to eat less crap I would therefore say I want to be motivated to eat more healthy foods that nurture my health. Act: as if you are tuned in to this goal. Seek out images, stimuli and experiences that support your radar and allow yourself to notice the naturally occurring incidences that arise for you as your R.A.S. presents them to you. Perhaps you can search through Facebook pages and like those with healthy lifestyle options, be sure to unlike any your may have already subscribed to that focus on 1000 great uses for chocolate. Subscribe to a gardening magazine. Do your window shopping in health food stores, eat out at vegan restaurants. Listen to pod casts on the topic. The idea is to give your R.A.S a kick start that is as cool calm and collected as an All Black setting up in front of the goal post with the whole of Eden Park silent patiently waiting for him to get it in. Review: Look at things again and again and again. Do it one more time with feeling. When your R.A.S. points out something that supports your goal and matches up take a good look at it. Say to yourself AHA!! - there's one, that's useful. Oh look there goes another one and there it goes again. Enjoy: Bottom line B.F.O of any DO experience is are you having any fun yet? Play with the concept. Go on I D.A.R.E. ya...
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https://www.facebook.com/pages/sungazing1 I love it when the plan comes together. When we are in the flow - the plan always rolls out in the perfect way. It may not seem so at the time but retrospectively we see the bigger picture. The AHA moment of ...Ohhh - that is why that happened! If everything is said for a reason does it affect the way you hear criticism? There is the perfect amount of time to achieve exactly what I need to achieve. Relationships last as long as they are meant to last. I will handle it. The universe will bring me that or better, ... are BFO mantra's that I remind myself of often. When we acknowledge that we are the creators of our own reality we become aware of just how powerful our skills of manifestation are. What we think about is what we get. So be very careful what you wish for. Today I've finally tuned into my health - I've had a head cold for a week or so (mental confusion and disorder according to Louise Hay ). But I've been ignoring that voice in my solar plexus telling me to SLOW DOWN, BE QUIET AND LOOK AFTER ME. A pressing deadline of facilitation tommorrow afternoon finally made me hydrate with something other than red wine, swallow the vitamins, a super spicy tom yum soup, get more sleep and resort to the steroids. If we don't learn the lesson the universe turns up the volume - or in THIS case... turns it off. In a final push to get me to listen to the screaming inside I have no voice. - Well only the croaky, husky more than sexy remains of one. And for a public speaker that is like trying to hang wallpaper with no arms. Beyond challenging. However I've learnt over time not to worry about these things. Worry is the most common form of meditation practiced by the civilised world. And it has the uncanny habit of drawing to you the exact circumstance that you did not want to attract. We have no need to worry because just maybe the master planner had a different outcome in mind anyway. My task today must be to write not talk. Like the corporate workshop tommorrow. I'm fully prepared, resources packed, well rested, nurturing myself yet still in a bubble of silence. I'm trusting that this DO learning opportunity will be perfect just the way it is... and due to an unforseen event in my clients world we have just deferred the training until next week. I now have a full day off to self nurture and heal. Thank you master planner. I am practising trusting the process, putting the thought out there of what it is that I want to achieve and remaining in the vortex certain that the law of attraction will sort it out for me in the best possible way. As Yoda said there is no try.. there is just DO or not DO. Test it out - next time you head to town ask the parking pixies to please have a parking space ready for you exactly where you need it. Believe it enough and it will happen. My kids love how this one works. Put the thought out there, no doubts, no worries and the plan will flow. We always smile thinking of the person who was dawdling along the street or lingering over their coffee having a sudden urge head back to their car and get out of that park. The only time it fails is when I forget to ask. As a child I used to think about car crashes at junctions of rural roads... don't ask me why. But I'd imagine the birds eye view of these two cars heading towards each other oblivious to the reality they were headed for yet destined to impact. It's a vision I carry in life, and it makes me very cautious at intersections especially country ones. Do you notice when the synchronicity pixies get to work on your day? At times the people and situations you run into are just too spot on to be a coincidence. When your world shrinks and the degrees of seperation become 2 not 7. Those occasions when you discover an old friend or three in an Chiang Mai night market. Or the complete stranger next to you at a random dinner party is your deceased bff's bridesmaid, spoken of often... but never before to. The head shaking moment when you realise that all the fab new friends at this weekends' 50th met you at a party your teen love took you to 30 years ago. It is indeed a small world and we are all somehow in connection with each other. D.A.R.E to believe in magic. Decide, Act, Review, Enjoy - We may not know all the ins and outs of how the energy flows from the dam to the light switch yet it does not stop us flicking on the light. Ask for what it is that you want, leave the universe to sort out the details. I used to worry a lot when a plan was not flowing, when things felt jarring. A date set and tickets booked to go away on a holiday that somehow felt like hard work. A proposal or bid for a client project that wasn't forming. Cash flow crisis or nothing to wear? A relationship or friendship that is faltering. Now I've learnt to let it go. That there is a bigger picture and generally pushing hard may brings me an outcome I regret. Events have a way of working themselves out. The hard to secure client may have required me to linger overseas away from my kids or gone bankrupt and not been able to pay. Where you focus your attention is where you get your results. At a meditation group years ago a wise crone told me that you may be wishing for a bit part in a film, while he director may have been willing to give you the lead. Because you never put the thought out there and were too attached to your outcome guess what you got? D.A.R.E. to dream big. D.A.R.E. to know that the plan will work out for the best. Trust the times your gut is telling you that something is not in integrity. My B.F.O taken from facebook today..A diamond is simply a lump of charcoal that handled stress superbly. God has two answers Yes and Not yet... If the path you are on is the path of least resistance. Stay on it. It's useful to be clear on what it is that you value. If you focus on getting more things that's exactly what you'll get and likely the debt that goes with them. If you focus on wealth over health, success over love, a beautiful face over a beautiful heart the plan will reflect exactly what you have chosen. Time is the most misunderstood dimension we operate in. We give up on goals thinking we are never going to get there. We stop pumping the pump just as the water is about to flow. Making a million by age 30 may not appear to have happened on your birthday. But when you are silent in your rocker reflecting back on life perhaps it was that seed thought the last day of your 29th year that turned into the money tree of your future. Or would have been if you hadn't thrown the baby out with the bath water, tossed your toys, spat the dummy and given up the ghost. If you would like help to clarify what it is that you value send me an email at the www.todo.net.nz contact DO page and I'll forward you a free activity to help you narrow down what it is that you DO want to attract. No obligations - free help for a free will planet. Because the magic of being human is that we have the will to be what ever it is we choose. That's why we are called human beings, not human havings or even human DO-ings. Start to create the plan you want to manifest. How would you like your life to be? Let the rest of the journey fall into place. Because life is the journey not the destination. Trust that there is a plan for you and that on many levels, possibly all - you are the master of it. Tell me what you plan to DO with your one wild and precious life - Mary Oliver , Summer Day What do dogs DO on their day off? Can't lie around ...that's their job! George Carlin Free from work or duty... able to move with calm and grace. Suits you sir... How do you spend your leisure time? TGIF ...and a whole weekend of it rises before me - well so the theory goes. Friday started early today at Arrow Ridge a stop work meeting for teachers meant all my kids home at 12.30. So I took the opportunity to kick the learning proposal writing to touch and catch up with my neighbour for a coffee and a chat. However in the pursuit of enjoyable activities I plan a couple of hours work tommorrow creating corporate culture for a client with office interior design. And I DO have a fair bit of duty to perform with kids who need to be taxi'd to parties and cheered on from the sidelines of the mini- x mountain bike race. I plan to move through it all with calm and grace, sharing with others that I'm flourishing and loving living a life loaded with leisure... and you? There is not much that I recall from my learning at school but one project in particular stands out. I can still see my artfully drawn bubble letter title page. "Leisure time and how we will spend it." The theory went that by the time I reached adulthood the world would be such a different place that endless hours of leisure would fill my world. And unless I learnt to capture the void and have a handy check list of activities with which to fill it I would surely fail. What fun it was to sit and daydream about the many hobbies, crafts, sports and pass times I would have to learn to engage in. To look at the skills required , tools I'd need and venues that I was sure to frequent. Ten minutes ago my middle child complained that she is bored. It's 3pm Friday afternoon the sun is shining we have the neighbours children here , the pool is open, the tennis court vacant. The baby chickens are looking way too cute and fluffy peeping for attention. There is art and craft materials, cookies to bake the TV is on and ALL devices are full charged. Short of hiring a performing artist and a bouncy castle I had to give my "learn to enjoy your own company" lecture. To encourage her to revel in the moment and relax. To look up and out, or within and about. To find the spark of fun and DO anything you want at all! We have acknowledged recently how precious our weekends as a family are. The engineer away most of the week and each day at Arrow Ridge a juggle of what to DO. Queenstown has the luxury of being a 365 day a year opportunity. Many of us are not religious about what days we worship the leisure gods. Our free time may be weather dependent, dictated by a rotating roster and seasonal. Ask many in this town when their next day off is at the moment and they hopefully suggest they may just fit one in during May. So leisure time may be nabbed in the moment. An alpha nap parked on the side of the road between the supermarket and your next appointment. Time on facebook late at night or maybe lunch with a friend who can almost be called a client if anyone from work sees you out. Then there are those professional pleasure seekers. Who have crafted a life out of leisure pursuits and have turned work into fun and fun into work. We are surrounded by them here, the skygods and snow gods. Those who fly and drink redbull as a diet staple. They wear the brands of sponsors who pay them to have fun and inspire the rest of us to get up off the swivel chair, spend back to back winters - though I fail to see the fun in that. They are adept at doing what ever it is they D.A.R.E to DO. But then is it leisure? What do they DO in their time off? Do they dress down, lie down or act down and out? One of my besties was delivered the pick up line - "Sooo...what do you DO?" "I'm a student." Being 40 something and gorgeous the reply though she is studying law was... "No your not" - "yes I am" - " No your not" - "yes I am" " No your not..." "Ok I'm not." "See I knew you weren't... who are you married to?" "I'm not"... "yes you are"... "No...I'm not"... "yes you are"... "Actually I'm not"... Yes... - you get the drift. What do you DO then...? "Well...Ok, I'm a princess, I live in a big house on a hill, I'm a princess. I have a tatoo of a heart on my arm with my daddy's name through it. My daddy's the maharajah and I'm a princess - I don't have to DO anything." Surely a princess lives a life of leisure, right? I hope she pops in when she has finished work. The real problem of leisure time is how to keep others from using yours. ~Arthur Lacey I never did a day's work in my life. It was all fun. Thomas Edison Take it easy baby , take it as it comes, be a specialist in having fun - Jim Morrison "Are you having any fun yet ?" One line mantras. B.F.O's - Blinding Flash of the Obvious moments. The AHA feeling. An opportunity to sum up the essence of your experience in just a few words. To me that is the phrase ....Best said to another when you are perhaps experiencing something that is no fun at all. Particularily useful when life seems to suck the big kumara. It's a cunning reminder that we are here for a good time not a long time and are fully capable of enjoying the journey. The sort of statement we see on a bumper sticker and want to recall for life. Last millenium I was heading to a meeting with the bank manager, WINZ had cancelled a trial program for transistioning long term unemployed people into work in Queenstown. We had already committed to the office space, training room and team. Our land lord was about to change the locks if the lease wasn't paid. I had no idea how I was going to keep the business let alone my life afloat. When on the way down the mall my financial controller turned to me and said... "Are you having any fun yet?" Instantly the pressure was off, we looked at each other the stress lifted and we began to laugh or was it cry? From memory a lot of both, we had to sit tears streaming to compose ourselves into the concerned adult individuals that we knew the finance representatives would assume that we would be. And the issue was certainly and suddenly back in perspective. I can't even remember how we sorted out the rent that day but we did, the world still turned but most importantly we relaxed, we had some fun and we learnt. Learn from the mistakes of others you don't live long enough to make them all yourself. If you obey all the rules your miss all the fun - Katherine Hepburn Sick to the stomach, a need to pee, sweaty palms, racing heart. A collegue reminded me recently are all symptoms of excitement. I'd been wrestling with my anxiety after the death of three significant others in my inner circle and it was manifesting in similar displays in my middle child. Time to examine what we like to DO when we are excited. Dress for a special occasion, day dream, plan, write a journal. make, give and receive gifts, find like minded souls to share the journey. Immerse in the task, become absorbed in the moment. Some purposeful choices to re-label the state and enjoy the day, moment by second. To nurture my inner children with happy voices, hugs, bike rides, compliments, squeals of glee, baking, adding novelty, parties and fun times with friends. To walk barefoot in the icy cold river collecting stones. To look up and see the light not at the end of the tunnel but right here we we are. In some call centres there are Fun Managers. The person whose role it really is to create the doughnut day and hand out the silly hats. It's not the wank factor the cynics among you would label it as. The best pull it off with aplomb. Celebrating moments, creating themes adding value to the brand and the day. Establishing employee retention and decreasing challenging customer moments. Because every moment deserves to be a great one. As we would like to think that Buddha said... "The trouble is we think we have time." Go on I D.A.R.E. you - Decide, Act, Review and Enjoy - Then do it again.... and again...and again. One more time with feeling! Climb something, set a goal, make a plan, throw yourself off or into anything. Scare your self silly. Fascination comes from fascinare - to cast a spell. Create magic in your day. Go out feel the warmth of sunlight on your skin or eat what it is you love for lunch. Drink out of beautiful glass, tell a joke, love an animal, smile more at yourself in the mirror. Acknowledge your natural beauty - you are the oldest you have ever been and the youngest you will be in this moment. Experience your wealth - you have life. Invite a group of random friends to play tennis and drink Pimms. Ensure enough of them know you well enough to turn up in nightclub attire, and 6 inch heels. Have new racquets and balls on display but touch neither. Drink the Pimms and add champagne. Go out. Pretend you are a tennis club. Talk loudly and passionately about who has the best back hand. Stay out all night. Tell stories on the couch. Laugh hard, long and loud about who wears the biggest nana pants. When your husbands walk in from their fishing trip in the morning throw the lillies out of the vase and pretend you are drinking the water. Are you having any fun yet? "What's in it?" ...Asks our middle child - te mokapuna. "Well... 2 x Hydrogen and 1 Oxygen. " At 8 there is a satisfied skip at my answer. It leaves me mulling questions...How do we make water - really? How do we use it? Abuse it? It's raining today a Chali Rain day; my eldest named a liquid treasure. Her dad a sky diver only ever got a day off when it rained and today it is indeed a Rainy day. February in Central Otago brings very few of them. One - on the 4th of Feb. Those adventure tourism professionals must be relishing the lie in bed this morning. It's the first in six weeks. Huge tracts of New Zealand officially in drought. Rivers dry - fish being moved by hand, stock hungry and the price of beef and milk set to soar. Gods own hydro powered nation may be on the whip lash end of a winter power price hike if the heavens don't open more frequently between now and then. Our changing use of assets puts the challenge of local governance into new paradigms - metering water, restricting water usage and debating ownership. Drive through McKenzie country or the back blocks of Bendigo and count the irrigation pivot pylons while trying to recall how the desert plains of the Lindis lands and Ardgour valley look before we turned them green. GM grass sprouting where there is no irrigation - is it dew feasting? Irrigation changes not only river flow levels but water table levels - flooding now seen in the Waitaki Valley on low rain fall levels due to a high water table in the wet season or bone dry plateaus in the drought. It is our base common denominator. We are water. Regardless of colour or creed. Look around you and see how we respect it? Hoteliers - are you still placing two bottles of plastic treasure beside each guest at turn down each night? A responsible guest will turn down your offer. Piles of bottles form the only landmarks on hikes through a Thai jungle to see the waterfall which today is not flowing. Do you clean your teeth with the tap on, save your grey water for your plants or fly your tipple in from the French Alps? How you act speaks so loudly I can't hear what you are saying. We take it for granted like its a fossil fuel and it may well be. Though there is no sustainable substitute. We need the real McCoy, no additives ideally, those we have already are due to our stuff ups with pollution and poor diet. I am far from guilt free. We have a bore and I use it to grow lawns and food. The hole in the ground so deep it continues to give me flow when the river below is low enough to make me guilty of consumption. I have the occasional major system flaw. Like piling the pony poop really close to the well neck. Thank god the engineer next door pointed that out before todays rain fall or we might have been settling a very different score. By the time it had been raining for four hours yesterday the social media trolls were over it already complaining about the weather. The council customer service teams are a long time over it I'm sure - the phone calls about the metering, the leaks and the monitoring. No understanding of the generational inequity that's resulted in these outcomes. A council that has managed to keep the shit out of the lake and the water flowing from your tap when your population has doubled needs to be congratulated not harranged. Look around the world and become fascinated by the way we honour the water gods or fight the lack of them. Western use of water is gluttony without breaking a commandment. Flushing toilets, swimming pools, power showers. On a Rainy day like today I suggest we sit back and look at our behaviour, while enjoying the sound of the rain on the roof and the wearing of gumboots to school. Thanks be to god above in the highest for crying on our day. Save it and treasure it because a day without it we can survive but even a week without it will kill many. All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was. Culture = group agreement to ritual. Corporate culture is no different to that in a petre dish. Same - same but different. DO - Learning, supports the strengthening of workplace culture through employee selection , training and identity empowerment. How your premisis looks, how the corporate values you have or are evolving are interpreted. If your team were a tribe what would it look like and be like? Does your business experience fluctuation of seasonalilty that translates into a very different summer tribe to winter tribe? Many of my adventure tourism clients experience this. Imagine a ski field every day in winter. Pre dawn early starts... The groomer team coming off shift with ice-laden beards and carhardts - the break of day often, way sub zero. Or being the food and beverage manager with the fluctuating need for staffing and production levels on powder days risking the wrath of the local ski god community. Compared to the summer tribe maintenance works and marketing teams where starting later and bbqs on the deck in casual clothes typify a Friday at work.. Perhaps your business is skydiving and it's September equinox. How do you keep the tandem masters, manifesters and camera people happy when mother nature does her thing every spring and blows hard day after day? Or you are a local council and the land use has changed from sheep farming to dairy and your water table level has risen and you flood risk has tripled along with angry farmers that your customer service team are dealing with one more time with feeling. When I worked with Progressive Enterprises my favorite job title was that of the space manager. Everyone wants to be a spaceman right? In the real world there are more of them than you think. They hold the golden key to brand management. Whether your product is displayed, stocked or not. If it is at eye level, on the ends or perhaps a scan back deal has been struck. On a bad day the spaceman runs a nationwide special on coackroach bait... except there are none of the varmints in the South Island. Or the hotel chain where everyone wears the same uniform in all properties regardless of global location , or climate. Corporate culutre can be visable in how individuals take their breaks. How meetings are held, what and when uniform items are worn. How does your team idenitfy as your organisation? What perks and quirks are typical in your workplace? What do your staff social functions say about you? How do you interact with your customers and key stake holders? DO you know what your tribe looks like, feels like and acts like? What bits can you encourage and how DO you enculturate new members to your team. This week I've been supporting the move of an organisation into a new office. Interpreting the challenge to raise the professionalism of a team. Time to lose the mis-matched coffee mugs, add some plants and ensure office colours reflect the brand. Will it be of value? It will be a message to those within and external to the organisation. Culture is the story we tell as a group that defines who and what it is that we are. What are you like? If something doesn't feel right, look right, sound right, smell right or seem right - it probably isn't. Yet how often do we let ourselves or others convince us that we are manifesting drama, not seeing things clearly or that we are wrong? When I teach conflict resolution in workshops we talk about dealing with issues when you first experience discomfort. And why we often don't choose to act-i-on things right at that first point of niggle. I ask how often was that first feeling wrong when you look back at a scenario that blew up. Answer never. I have coached clients who have been at the extremes of the elements during military service and survived when others have taken their own lives. Their gut instincts kept them alive there yet in the boardroom they don't trust the gut feeling that someone may be manipulating a situation. I bet they are not wrong. I've had that quiet little voice that seems to rise up from somewhere deep inside of me tell me I'm being managed or led up a path that is not of my own making. Yet I've allowed others to talk over it, to tell me I have a problem or that I am the one who needs to toe the line. Only to realise every single time further down the track that the voice was spot on and that I was indeed correct not to waiver. That my instincts were on target, that I could have saved myself a lot of grief, self doubt and mayhem by belief in my self and my ability to judge what is going to serve me well. Our instincts are to keep us safe and to trigger the flight or fight skills primate in all of us. Some like smoke alarms are now hair triggered towards anxiety and we are over conditioned to dumbing down our feelings and responses. Perhaps you body has been screaming for so long for you to listen to it that now it reacts to every threat with caution. Because if you haven't listened in the past I better act up real quick to get you to listen now. If you start listening again to what your instincts are trying to tell you the relief is instant. The faith empowering and the self trust strengthening. Your soul calms down and you don't have to panic any more because you are now aware you will handle it, the universe doesn't bring you anything that you can't handle and we can take care of ourselves. It's the voices in our solar plexus that we need to be quiet enough to hear. For those who are busy telling themselves that they don't have any little voices to listen to it's exactly that voice that I'm talking about. The one that tells you gently that you or someone you are in connection with is acting out of integrity. That what they are saying thinking and doing are not lining up. Just go with it. Buy yourself some time and say thanks but no thanks, or not just now. Take the time to listen and to trust what you are feeling. What's the rush. Try it today. Tune into your instincts next time you have to make a decision. Don't weigh up the logic just go quiet allow yourself to tap into source and ask yourself yes or no? Stay or Go? Block or Flow? Go with that first answer calmly and gently one small step at a time. Let me know how it works for you. Put your gut out there to test the wind. Lycra or crampons? Both choices I have managed to avoid today but for some now in both they may be questioning what's around the next corner on this adventure. It's Gods Zone race time and participant kits required extreme climbing gear. Multi sporters are the guru geeks of our town. By day they mascarade as company directors, engineers, real estate agents or work in retail. By weekend they push sleep depraved into the hills, racing, climbing, kyacking and conquoring. - Where? not even they know until they get there - I live in awe. For thousands near the Arrow today is Mototapu time, when Shania Twain opens her land thanks to the OIC rules that surrounded it's purchase for the mean and the keen to trek from Wanaka across the valley by bike and foot. It's become a walk in the park completed so often by some there was head scratching last night wondering why it was they thought a 5th time would be different. Perhaps it's for the carbo load feasting before it... guilt free indulgence. For others it is the first big push out of the comfort zone how hard can riding a bike be?? By now they may be wishing they'd purchased the comfy seat 2000 version of their padded shorts instead of the crib in the Southern Riveria or that Chanel handbag. Or perhaps they are pausing, daring to look behind them to see why that friend the planner is taking it so carefully down the hills when surely that's the easy side of the ride and we are not even half way in. For the fast and furious it's already done and dusted, they'll be lying in the village, eating a Mantra samosa, being felt up by physios and welcoming number after number across the line to local celeb torts and cheers - I wonder if we'll see Chuck's mum? For other friends today is an adventure of another kind. Two souls meeting as one to tie the knot and begin a different kind of story, married, fiesta style. Some friends scattered by distance or carnage are sending love via moonbeams and honoring them in creative ways, planting cherry trees, writing love notes in the sand and adding beats to spotify. Then there are those who are ten years into their married story - wrapped up in their off spring or overseas travel. Living lifes adventure on opposite sides of the world doing it well all the same. There's parties tonight, competitions to win and work to complete. Some Ad-venture-rs are too busy to take "time off" right now but we'll get there... where ever there may be. For me what adventure does the rest of today hold? An experience of being in the flow. I've opted out of the above pursuits ( see my earlier blog on Saying NO being a really a big yes). To focus on my own state of calm and retreat from the roaring crowd. Some me time DO-ing what I love to DO - I woke with my youngest childs arm across my neck, a sleep hug. I hadn't noticed her climbing in to my bed but it was well after I was rounding up the cairn terrier from his rabbit slaughter at 2am, belated thanks to the father in law for the spot light it does work on rabbits, and horses who seemed very surprised at how I look in my nightie at 1000 plus lumens. I've had a late breakfast in bed - an almost luke warm weak cup of tea, barely cooked peanut butter toast with a freshly plucked rose on the plate side. I've been out doing some friend stalking. The chickens and I have had our chat over their La rumbla scraps, the sprinklers are all on as is the dish washer and the washing machine - water consumption is in abundance, the house is clean and silent - the children are all gone, we've raised them well enough they all have friends. The bliss of the solitude to write. There are still those cherry trees to plant, a new wwooffer arrival, mojito hour and that's just in the breaks. The advenutres that await will surely feature in another blog. I don't yet know but I've commited to go with the flow. When you have no idea what's happening next, your excited about the process. I love it when a plan comes together particularily when you have no idea of what the plan is. To enjoy every adventure for what it is, a moment to smile lots and laugh plenty. Life is the journey not the desitination and isn't it the best adventure of all. You've partied long and hard in the Queenstown good bars, schmoozing with hotties, spending your last $ at 5am on that cockadoodle-oink from Fergburger, thinking it would do you the next two meals and it did. Then the perfect winter storm disrupts ALL flights AND road access out of here and you are over that fine line between chaos and disorder. What would you do with zero cash and no way home for a day or two? In HongKong you'd sleep in the airport, but you won't be doing any of that in ZQN - our terminal wisely shuts shop between the last and first flights of the day. We locals need a break from the drama at some point and there is no alternative refuge. No half way house, no warm bus stops. Dollar chewing alternatives are every where you turn. This is an all too common scenario for some of the international revellers that frequent here. A gap between cashflow and serve-us's that seems like a glacial crevasse. Perhaps you are like my friend the wwoofer trading hours of work for bed and food so you can ride extreme bike trails on Skyline. Only to crush your kidney by trying to bungy over your handle bars. You've just found out the long-ride way that our closest base hospital is two bumpy hours south. You know no one in vegas and you didn't have your phone charger tucked into your lycra with which to call your mum. Prior to social networking these people would have been very unhappy campers indeed. Social media can be the collection point for soul-saving-support when life throws you a gap and you have no idea of how you are going to fill it. Messages of... I need a lift or a bed, has anyone seen this shop lifter? Or I have a few bulbs to give away or jokes to tell are building communities faster and in more user friendly ways than a chat to your neighbour over the fence could ever have imagineered. Having a digital presence is making us all into kinder more caring human beings. Each status update or tweet is a call to Act-i-on. Do I like this, how can I be involved, does it make me want to smile and pass it on? It's like learning to play nicely and share your toys all over again. It's a moment by moment challenge to live in integrity. To be certain that what you say, think and DO line up and are the same.There is a lot of crap-chat about fake profiles and watching how you put on your facebook face. Yet I choose to believe that what you do on line makes you so visable that your real world responds to it immediately, dynamically. If what you think you are like and what you are like fail to add up, real people quickly let you know. Those that haven't embraced their digital presence are becoming conspicuous by their absence. What to selfish to share? I love the speed at which solutions are created through digital platforming. A horse float found, a criminal arrested, a million likes to stop someone smoking. If you need an answer just ask Gog. If you need a job link up and hook in. For those who tell you to stop wasting time on line. Think how many hours there are between that airport reopening, or minutes lying flat on your back in hospital with no one to talk to and nothing to read. Care to connect and fill the gaps. Build bridges and get in underneath people, places and projects. Scroll rather than troll through your news feed and connections to make the world a closer and more caring place faster. Build a bridge and get over it. When we give we are all the more richer for being. So excited - I have 30 saffron bulbs to trial at Arrow Ridge. All via facebook and like souled-individuals, learning and sharing seed thoughts of sustainability in Central Otago. Bulbs offered and transported through social networking. Gotta love how the world works today. Thank you, thank you, thank you to those willing to share. 30 bulbs as a trial crop or just because... Saffron one of our best restaurants name sakes, as a crop - new to the region but not to the world. A gold crop, high maintenance and hard work like many Arrowtown women, born of gold, and stunning. A new plant is a new story, untold and untested. Better than a delivery of on line shopping from Asos. Clothes that look great on the modeIs but carry the guilt of air miles from the UK even though shipping is free... a fashion fail with kiwi cankles. I get to see if I can encourage those 30 bulbs to thrive here. It may seem nothing to some but to seed-crop-cravers like me 30 bulbs are 30 gold nuggets. I've been gathering seeds; sweet peas, parsley, corriander, cucumbers, peas, beans and tomatoes to propagate next spring. I'm very aware that some places on our planet what I am doing for enjoyment and satisfaction is a crime. I get a buzz each time I mulch the pumpkins in the horse poop, the parsely and mint from generations ago and wild tomatoes or beans that have found crevices and thrived. Arrowtown, a living historic village filled with high end estates, first family homes and holiday cribs. Artisan galleries, boutique shopping, restaurants where slow food that showcases Central Otago produce and wines thrive. Villagers from all walks wax lyrical describing puff balls bigger than your head harvested in the early morning dew of autumn. Rowan berries, elderflower and rose syrups. Apple trees, apricots and quince hang on the river tracks and verges. Wild black berries and yellow plums are harvested on 4-wd drive trips up river to Macetown. We worship our chefs who turn rabbits shot on the block into Moroccan feasts. Or a rainbow trout, Tar or fallow deer dropped off by whanau to full the freezers for the wwoofers. Our prized silver dorkings are fed on tapas from La Rumbla - scraps so good the chicken run must be dog proof or the bulimic suffering big black walrus of a labravac dog will surely die. Living in central we battle the climate, the days are shortening at one end while the shadows are lengthening at the other. Hot days and lingering afternoons are being swallowed by darkles in the morning and the threat of frost. I dare not look when daylight saving ends. Too soon we will be swallowed by -14 degrees and winter. To walk bare foot on the lawn freshly mown and watered with our bore supply cold and crisp from the Arrow. We can eat and grow lawns, chip and putt golf balls and splash in clear river pools. We may simply sit majestic amongst the mountains. Nurturing the 100 mile diet philosophy. Reflecting on the chinese market gardeners, gold miners and settlers who have sown seed here before us. And get prepared to bed down for winter. Gathering and preserving what we can and paying it forward when we have an abundance to share. |
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