3 key mottos for life

I was mulling this morning on my 3 key mottos for life.

Follow your bliss

If anyone can, YOU can

Just take the next step

If you act on these, you won’t go far wrong!

Give yourself 3 targets

Although I’m taken at the moment with the idea of having no goals at all, I received a note from a friend the other day thanking me for the advice I gave with regards to running a marathon, which resulted in them really enjoying it and having a great sense of achievement.

The advice I gave, which I learned the hard way from running a couple of marathons myself, was to set three targets when it comes to running a marathon.

Your first, and for me your most important, target is to complete it (no attachment to any time target) and, even more importantly, to enjoy the whole experience from start to finish.

If you’ve never run a marathon before, this should probably be your only target. Don’t burden yourself with any specific time targets.

Assuming you’ve run a marathon before, your second target is a finish time that even if things don’t work out perfectly on the day, you believe you should be able to achieve.

Your third target is your best finish time, one that you know you can do based on the training you have completed and assuming that everything goes well.

This is the best that you can expect.

The other key to your three targets is to ensure that you achieve the first target before you move on to the next one.

There is nothing worse than setting yourself only one target and realising, with half a marathon still to go, that you’re not going to achieve your target.

Believe me, I’ve been there. It was 13.1 miles of suffering every step of the way.

The marathon where I set three targets, however, I achieved the first two and was over the moon, planning my next marathon as I walked away wrapped in my foil blanket.

So how can this apply to work and life targets?

Whatever target, or targets, you set yourself, the principle of going the distance at whatever pace and style which allows you to enjoy the whole experience, should be your first, and most important, target.

Don’t go for any other targets until you are achieving that first!

3 ways to write yourself happy

In Professor Richard Wiseman’s excellent book “59 seconds” he describes three ways of writing that have been scientifically proven to have a quick and significant impact on improving everyday happiness.

1. The first way is to write down things (ideally at least 5 and at least once a week) for which you are grateful.
   
   
2. The second way is to write about your perfect, or ideal future, or about the most wonderful experience in your life.
   
   
3. The third way is to write about someone you love and why they mean so much to you. The exercise that was researched involved writing for 20 minutes three times over the course of five weeks.

I can vouch for the first two ways with first-hand experience, now to experiment with the third way.

Reinvent your New Year

Having never been a particular fan of New Year’s resolutions, I’ve been inspired by a couple of new alternatives that I’ve just discovered via Chris Brogan and Jacqueline Carly.

Chris Brogan has used a technique for the past several years of coming up with 3 words that he then uses as beacons to guide him throughout the coming year.

You choose 3 words that “will bolster you and give you a direction that goes beyond your goals”.

The 3 words I’ve chosen for 2012 are:

Simplify – I will de-clutter my workspace, my living space, my ideas and my approach to my business and my life, simplifying wherever and whenever possible.

Connect – I will use every opportunity to connect more deeply with other people, with nature, to my intuition and my “other than conscious” self.

Show up – Yes, I know it’s two words, but it’s a 2-word phrase that means one thing to me. I will show up whenever it occurs to me that it might be a good opportunity to do something exciting, inspiring and true to myself, even though it carries risk.

Jacqueline Carly’s technique is based on the same principle by which my “run a mile each day” started.

She calls it a “12 in 12”, which is 12 things that she commits to do, no matter the outcome, in 2012.

You choose one thing that you commit to do every day in January.

At the end of January you commit to do one new thing in February, whilst deciding whether to keep going with January’s one thing.

You then continue this each month of 2012.

For details see Jacqui’s 12 in 12.

My commitment for January is to clear my office space (desk, floor, sofa) at the end of each day.

I'll decide February's commitment in 4 weeks, and will also decide whether to keep going with the office clearing then too.

Have fun!

Your January challenge

To celebrate my completion of 2 years of running at least a mile every day. this morning I ran / walked 10 miles, the furthest I have managed in 6 months.

It wasn't fast. At an average pace of 11 minutes 17 seconds per mile, most competitive runners would turn their noses up at that sort of performance.

But I swear by combining running and walking, as championed by former Olympian Jeff Galloway. I used his training methods to complete my most enjoyable marathon in New York eight years ago.

Seeing as it's New Year's Eve and everyone's making their new year's resolutions, I challenge you to take on the one I set myself two years ago today, and that was to run (or you can run/walk) at least a mile each day for the month of January.

Who knows where that might take you?

My own challenge expanded dramatically from January to an experiment that in the last 2 years has taken me over 1600 miles and 276 hours of running.

I'm still experimenting to see where it takes me next.

Happy New Year to you!