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We often live life with little thought for the small things we do. Living in consequence is not necessarily about all the big decisions we have to make in life either, but rather understanding all the actions we take from the moment we wake up to the time we put our head on the pillow at night.

When we consider what we do every day from the time we awake to the time we go to sleep, a lot of it happens on autopilot. Monday to Friday may look slightly different to the weekend but generally we find ourselves in a routine. Monday morning the alarm goes off and we hit the snooze button, until we absolutely have to get up. We reluctantly drag our semi-asleep body to the bathroom, followed by the kitchen. We press a few buttons in hope to wake up, once the sweet perfume of caffeine has infiltrated our cells. But because we hit snooze one too many times, we find ourselves rushing around again to make it to work and there is no time to even enjoy the coffee. We have to haste the kids out of the house. We have to run to make it to the train, but like the week before, we miss it. Then we do the same things at work, and we rush from meeting to meeting, and have the same conversations ten times about what activities we participated in on the weekend. Then we have our mid-morning coffee to ensure that our energy levels don’t plummet too soon because we went to bed late again the night before, watching mind-numbing TV shows.  It keeps repeating all throughout the week. The only difference between Monday and Friday is that people ask us about our plans for the weekend instead of what we did last weekend. And the sad part, no one actually cares.

A day turns into a week. A week turns into a month, and then into a year and we spend most of it trying to catch up and do better the next day, only to find ourselves doing the same thing yet again and time seems to escape us. We even spend time talking to others how time runs faster now. We fill our days with meaningless conversations either about the past or the future and wonder why we are never in the present. We seem to not understand why the days just slip away from us and we can never get on top of things, even if we tried. We often think that hitting the snooze button today won’t matter, because we can do better tomorrow. We think that having conversations that no one cares about doesn’t matter, because we all have them and it is a way of fitting in and showing interest. We think that the running around is just how it is. Is that really the most beneficial way for all of us though? Does the constant repeat of the same actions not also equal a reaction and consequences?

Whilst most people are familiar with the concept of “actions lead to consequences”, in our daily life, we don’t think much about it. We rarely consider consequences of everyday small choices as important. It is only when we are faced with life-altering decisions, that we weigh up our actions and the possible ramifications. To live in consequence is more than just thinking about big actions, but considering the small decisions we make daily. It is often the smallest decisions that carry the biggest weight. To live every day with meaning means to be deliberate with every action, with every conversation, with every word that leaves our mouth, and with every step we take. It means to start being conscious and waking up in a world that so desperately tries to keep us asleep by doing mind-numbing things. It is about taking control back of our life and not finding ourselves on the back foot constantly.

To live in consequence is about becoming aware of everything we do and understanding why we do it. It is about comprehending whether the unconscious habit that we action every day is the one that is holding us back. It is about breaking the cycle of keeping ourselves stuck and being fully awake from the moment we wake up. It is about knowing whether succumbing to the seduction of coffee will help us with our future or hold us back. It is about stopping to negotiate with ourselves why we need to hit the snooze button and just getting up. It is about noticing the things we usually miss, like the wonders of the world and nature around us. It is about setting things in motion that conversations can shift from meaningless rubbish about something or someone, to impactful discussions that leave us in awe and challenge our thinking, so we can grow.

So find it within yourself to not just open those pretty eyes of yours when the alarm goes off, but to fully awake to life and to everything it has to offer. Awake to every action that you undertake and say “no” to the one that don’t serve you. It is only then, when you live in consequence, that you realise that you don’t even need an alarm clock or the caffeine because there is no amount of tiredness that could keep you from the endless possibilities this precious thing called life has to offer.

If there is one thing to stop immediately, it is gossiping. Not tomorrow, not on Monday, not any other time, but right now. To participate in gossip is one of the most detrimental actions one can undertake, but ironically, it is broadly accepted in the world we live in. To gossip can hurt people in more ways than one. It can absolutely destroy someone’s reputation and life. If we think that we didn’t start the rumour and therefore us participating in it is not as bad, it is. It is equally as bad, maybe even worse. Gossiping carries a lot of negative energy; energy that could be spent differently, and it says more about us than the person we talk about.

Gossiping is most fascinating as it is widely accepted in our society as a way to bond with others. It is mind-blowing when we realise that gossiping helps us to fit in with others. If we share information about someone else, especially information that has drama attached to it, we are more likely to be accepted in particular groups. People love to be in the know and love to have information confirmed about someone else. It makes them feel better about themselves and makes them feel superior. It reminds them that their situation is not so bad. It is also a way of feeling one has power over someone else. Whilst it may provide temporary relief of one’s own issues, what gossiping really says is that one has low self-esteem and one does not even respect oneself.

Gossiping means we can take away the focus from our own miserable life and put someone else down. Even if what we say about someone has some truth to it, is it really our job to talk about it and let other people know? Is it our job to talk about their problems? About their failings? What about their feelings? We are so upset when someone else is spreading rumours about us but we do not consider how others feel when we talk about them. This is especially so, when we have been hurt by someone and we think we can hurt them back by talking about them. They may be bad people and treat us or others wrong, but it does not give us a right to spread rumours about them. Maybe they are also fighting their own demons, like we all do. And who are we to judge? One should be very careful with throwing rocks when one may sit in a glasshouse.

The same goes for drama. People will always try to get us into someone else’s or their own drama. It is probably also why people love soap operas, or mind-numbing reality TV shows. They are full of drama. It is sad that we derive pleasure from other people’s suffering and we have nothing better to do, than to watch other people fail. When people try to suck us into drama, we should be very careful as it may backfire; not onto them, but us. We may be the ones ending up in the firing line. Of course, we want to help people and be there for them, but we need to understand when to help and how to help, and when to step away to not inadvertently help feed the drama. We cannot help no one with their drama, we just cultivate and generate negativity for them, and also for ourselves. Nothing good can come from it and no amount of fitting into a group is worth being put into the centre of someone’s drama, or destroying someone’s life. And let’s not forget, the people who we generally gossip with, who seem to be so loyal, are also talking about us. Don’t kid yourself; as soon as you don’t gossip with them, they will stab you in the back, and spread rumours about you.

You may wonder what you have to talk to people about if it is not to talk about others’ shortcomings? You may also wonder what happens if you are not in the know. But do you really need to know? Does it really impact your life positively knowing about other people’s lives? If you have nothing to talk about when you cut out the gossip, then maybe they are not the people you should hang out with in the first place. But cutting out gossip also gives you a chance to worry about your own life. And really, the only thing you should actually worry about is your life and not whether someone did something or not. All those people that complain that they have no time for meditation, exercise, writing, or anything else, that could enhance their life, could use the time that they spend gossiping, to work on themselves.

Do you want to be known for the person who gossips, or the person who is too busy worrying about themselves and where they are going? I know we have all been there at one point or another, but now is the time to stop it and worry about your own life and how you can help yourself and build the life of your dreams. Forget about fitting in, because your job is not to fit in. Your job is to be the best version of who you are. Forget about having to know everything about everyone, because the only thing you need to know is who you are and what you do.

Have you ever watched the TV-show “Alone”? You probably can guess that I am not someone who promotes watching TV shows, however, if you want to learn something about humans, and what happens to the mind when one is in absolute isolation in nature and has to forage for food to survive, I highly recommend it. This post is not about the TV-show, I am sorry to disappoint, but it got me thinking about being alone, why we may not want to be alone, but also what great opportunity awaits us by consciously choosing “alone-time”.

To start off with, let’s get clear on one thing. Being alone and feeling lonely are not the same. Most people use these words interchangeably and confuse one with the other. In its simplest explanation, being alone means not having any people physically around oneself, i.e. you are going for a walk in the woods by yourself with no other person in sight. In contrast, feeling lonely, is an emotional state. It has nothing to do with whether there are people around or not; it is an emotion. Likewise, one cannot feel alone, because alone is a physical state. In fairness, and probably the reason why people don’t differentiate between the two, one can feel lonely when one is alone. This is often a reason why we choose not to be in isolation. We are scared, we may find ourselves feeling lonely. In pursuit of avoiding such feeling, we surround ourselves with people we don’t necessarily like and do things we dread. Ironically, by that very action we may find ourselves exactly there; drowning in loneliness whilst being in a sea of people.

We live in a society where being alone is not necessarily celebrated, rather the opposite. It could even be seen as social ‘suicide’ when we choose isolation. We are supposed to go to the parties, we are supposed to surround ourselves with people, we are supposed to fill our weekends with brunches, lunches, coffees, and dinners. We are supposed to have a significant other. We are supposed to…. you fill in the gaps. If we don’t do or have most of these things that the TV ads tell us to, and choose solitude instead, society lets us know that we are not following the norm. People will look at us funny and will question what we do by ourselves. They will wonder whether there is something wrong with us. People will call us ‘different’, ‘strange’ and even ‘difficult’.  

Besides the social aspect, the pressure of fitting in, and the fear of being lonely, there is several other reasons for not choosing alone-time. One such reason is a complicated past and we have co-dependency issues and/or were abandoned as a child and as such we are too scared of solitude. Another explanation might be that we don’t actually like ourselves that much. It could be because when we are alone, we might reflect on situations that we didn’t handle well in the past and we dwell on them. It could also be said that by spending time alone, a lot of uncomfortable thoughts may come up and we don’t want to deal with those. Another reason could be that we don’t know who we are, what we like, and we are too scared to find out. Inevitably, we miss a great chance to put a stop to the rubbish we tell ourselves, discontinue that negativity that runs on auto-pilot, and discover treasures we didn’t know we had within us.

Some people cope with being alone better than others. It is easier for introverts to spend time by themselves, as compared to extroverts. This is purely because introverts recharge their batteries by being on their own, whereas extroverts get energy from being around others. It is also important to mention that we are not meant to be by ourselves all the time. We are social creatures after all and as such need connection with others. A point also needs to be made that sometimes being alone is not the right choice and, in some situations, one should surround oneself with others, but one has to know when those moments are. We need to find a balance and choose healthy alone-time to not only build a strong relationship with ourselves but to build a strong mind and we can only do that when we make time for ourselves.

Being alone and choosing to spend time by yourself, can open you up to the most amazing relationship yet- the relationship with yourself. You see, you come here alone and you leave this place alone. People come and go. Situations and events come and go. Jobs come and go. But the one who is always by your side is you. You will always have the support of yourself. You can always rely on yourself. When you choose spending time with yourself and go within, you build the strength to stop relying on others and finding worth within yourself. You stop asking for permission to be you and start becoming you. Being by yourself means you get an opportunity to get to know your ideas and visions and understand when you stand in your own way and how you get out of the way. A strong mind can only be fostered when one builds a strong relationship with oneself and when one knows oneself that well to master oneself.

So find some time to get to know yourself and stop running away from the great person that you are.

Given my last post was about sacrifice, it is only natural to dedicate this post to motivation and discipline. A lot of people talk about motivation and doing the thing (whatever the thing is), when they are motivated or when they feel like it. Most of us wait for motivation to surface in order for us to change something. We think we are not ready until motivation inspires us.

Whilst there may be some desire to start something, often the trouble is the action-part of starting. You see, motivation does not necessarily mean action. We may truly want to start making changes and want to commit to a new routine, but we don’t know where to start, or what to do. We feel, we are not ready because we have nothing, and we know nothing. At that stage, motivation is even too scared to show its face. If we consider though, that our starting point is exactly where we currently are, we can start right there. We don’t need anything to start, but ourselves. I guess we are still waiting for the action-part of motivation to kick in, and in the meantime, we get busy consulting the book of excuses.

For some people, motivation, in the sense of being the driving force of action, does shows up and we start doing something. Usually at the point when we have had enough, or we randomly get inspired by someone or something, only to find ourselves weeks or sometimes just days after, right back where we began. We find ourselves in the past, doing what we have always done. We know what to expect and continue living a life that we don’t even like that much. When the pain of Groundhog Day gets too much, motivation knocks on our door, we do something, and then stop again. And it keeps repeating itself over and over again. By now, we have successfully created a Yo-Yo Effect, just not with our bodies, but with our dreams. We bring them closer to then move them further away. We kill our dreams faster than a knife fight in a phone booth.

We wait for a new habit to start when either motivation is high, or there is a deadline that we set ourselves for after an event in the calendar. Statistically speaking, more than 90% of people fail with their New Year’s resolution by February. Why would that be? One of the most common reasons is because motivation has disappeared. Likewise, the people who wait until Monday to change, fail at some point or other. They may not fail in the first week, but at some stage, they will, because motivation has gone. If we truly want to change, we don’t have to wait for a new year, or for after the holiday season. We don’t have to wait for a specific day of the week, or even tomorrow. If we want to change and if we say enough is enough, we start right here, right now.

It is also important to consider the factors attributing to motivation. For those among us where motivation is externally driven, i.e. more money if we do something, external validation if we lose weight, it is a much more challenging undertaking sticking to new habits. For those of us who in fact link motivation intrinsically to an internal value, where achieving something means something to us and it becomes a necessity to achieve a goal, it will be much easier. This way, we understand why we do something even when it sucks. That is where discipline is our best friend because we do the thing even when we are not motivated.

So the point is that motivation is fleeting and it is discipline that keeps us going. Discipline means to do the things that we may not want to do but are necessary. When we don’t want to do a workout because we don’t feel like it, or we don’t want to eat the healthy food because we feel like the sugary treat, it is discipline that keeps us in line. Motivation will most certainly not be there when life is not going our way but discipline is at our side and we do it anyway. Discipline is making a commitment to ourselves that we are not doing something for the short-term, but we are changing our entire life little by little, day by day. Discipline is applying ourselves every single day, and do what we set out to do, regardless of us being ready, feeling like it, or having a mediocre day.

Find it within yourself to do the hard part, to suffer through the workout, the writing, the long meditation, the long hours of study, whatever it is. Find it within yourself to work hard on yourself to liberate yourself from the chains of the past and to start living the life that you want. It is the small things that we do every day that accumulate to the big things in the end. Love yourself enough to want better for yourself and keep working even when you don’t feel like it.

Sacrifice is a funny thing. Most people conceptually understand what sacrifice is; to give up something to get something else. In theory it all sounds easy but in practice it looks quite different. We operate as if we don’t have to give up something to get something else. We live like we can have the cake and eat it too. Even worse, we get to a place where we think it is okay not to do what is required, because no one else is giving up the things either. Why should we? And hey, we need to make sure we fit in.

The truth is that life is a choice, life is an ‘either/or’ situation. Life is full of decisions where we have to choose one way or the other (or indecisions, which are also choices). There has to be something to give up, in order to get something else. Put in simple terms, you know that in order to release weight and get into better shape you have to sacrifice your potato-time on the couch for working out. You have to forgo the junk food for healthy food. If you want to be a medical doctor you have to spend time studying, attending university, endure long residency hours, and forgo sleep and your social life. If you want to save more money you have to either spend time finding a better paid job or an additional job or spend less on the things that you buy (or both).

Whilst we are quite aware of it, the willingness to make sacrifices for our own betterment seems limited. Maybe we don’t strive for attaining our full potential because the thought of doing the actual work is scary and quite possibly overwhelming. Maybe we aim for average instead because it is easier and everyone else is doing it and seems to be fine with it. We accept our external environment as our reality, and we accept that the mountain may just be too steep to climb.

I guess the biggest hurdle in sacrifice is the ‘giving up’ component of it all because it feels like we miss out on all the fun stuff, but possibly on all the toxic stuff too that we secretly love and are attached to. One interesting one I have come across is having to give up complaining to others about our situation. Isn’t the whinging about how bad our situation is just so intoxicating? We can blame someone or something for our misfortune. We don’t have to take responsibility. It sure may be a bad situation that we find ourselves in and it may not be our fault to have gotten to that position either, but it sure is our job to get ourselves out of it. No one is coming to save us and no amount of whinging about it will change that either. We have to save ourselves and start making sacrifices.

At some point we have to wonder if we are living or purely existing and if existing is the choice, that is fine. For me, existing is too painful. It is a life filled with being run by my emotions instead of taking measured steps towards a life that I truly want. The point is, it is up to us whether we are willing to sacrifice our current destructive habits and dare to do the uncommon, i.e. getting up at 4.30am, not eating dessert, not participating in gossip and spending time by ourselves, to build and work on our craft. Isn’t the pursuit of our own greatness more fulfilling than leading a ‘normal life’ as prescribed by society?

I think sacrifice has a bad reputation but if we are willing to see it as a friend, sacrifice can actually help us achieve living our best life, and it frees us up to create great habits and disciplines to live a life that means something to us.

I have pondered all week what to write and I have started several different articles. None of them seem to flow, none of them seem to sit right, none of them feel particularly interesting. My writing is a reflection of how my week went. Too many thoughts are circling around and in all sorts of directions. As soon as I catch a thought and am able to make sense of it, it moves on. This action happens a lot quicker than the speed of my typing. I even find myself writing the heading to something and then I don’t know what to write about. It is like staring at a blank page, that is ready to be infused with letters, but as soon as I lay my fingers on the keyboard, nothing useful is being typed, or so it feels. All sorts of random thoughts that are being interrupted by other random thoughts. It is like our thoughts decide to go on an excursion.

This journey can be frustrating, especially when you had no intention of going on a road trip. Whilst you may have a clear idea or plan on how to get from A to B, one thought didn’t go to the bathroom before jumping in the car and we all need to stop at ‘worry’-town. Then another is thirsty, and we need to grab ‘distraction’ drinks. Another thought decided to invite someone else along and you need to do a detour to catch that thought but as soon as you rock up, it decides it doesn’t want to come anymore. You get back into the car, finally back enroute, when yet another thought jumps into the driver seat and takes the exit which leads into ‘confused’-ville. Before you know it, you are in a town that is not even on the map, and you try to work your way back to the main road to get to your intended destination.

This is a sweet little mess in the head much like scrambled eggs, and not even the good kind with chives on top. All you actually wanted is sunny side up eggs with a clear delineation between the yolk and the egg white. These eggs sit nicely next to each other, with a soft and runny yolk. You wanted your thoughts to be exactly like these perfectly organised little eggs with one thought next to the other, but you got yourself a scramble instead.

This can be annoying and people often get mad at themselves when everything is unorganised. And as much as I love a mini tantrum myself, the best course of action is to stop for a second. When you look at the scramble and observe it, it is not necessarily a bad thing. Quite possibly, it could be exciting, useful and maybe the start of something delicious.

Let’s consider scrambled eggs. To create the perfect fluffy scramble, you need to know to keep the heat low and understand at which precise moment to disturb the eggs to fully incorporate the yolks with the egg whites and when to fold them. When you set out for sunny side up eggs, the pan is hot. When you accidentally disturb the egg yolks and you can’t have perfect sunny side up eggs, the best way to salvage the eggs is to turn them into a scramble. However, at this point the yolks cannot fully mix with the egg whites anymore as the heat doesn’t allow for it; the pan is too hot. What you end up with is a messy scramble where the yolks are still having the colour of yolks and you clearly also see egg whites.

When you overlay this with your thoughts, and how our thoughts would come together, what you get is thoughts that are not fully mixed up but still show up as they are. And whilst it may not seem to be that great, this situation can be most precious. Your thoughts may not be as tasty as the fluffy ones, but they are still standing in their own rights. Maybe, just maybe, you can also find a real gem in this scramble. Only when you have random thoughts that are trying to mix together but are still somewhat separated, can you see some thoughts that are trying to come to the surface, that you may not have otherwise witnessed.

It is like taking that road trip where you end up in a place that is not even on the map. I am not sure about you, but every time I have actually let myself go off route to a place that I had not intended to be in, I found something worthwhile. I have had the best experiences, met incredible people (and thoughts) in the unplanned situations. When we don’t try to force an outcome and simple allow ourselves to go with the flow, we may just have a good time after all. This is scratching the surface to another topic that I am starting to write about (The topic of ‘control issues’ which has lead towards starting my 10^th document).

So where am I going with this? When there is a scramble cooking away in your head, take the time to maybe practice a ‘thought-dump’. This is where you write down random thoughts (and maybe even start ten different documents like me). Let yourself go on the road trip with your thoughts and be curious but don’t attach to them either. Let them be what they are but allow them to flow without having to read into them.

The point is, sometimes being all over the shop is not such a bad thing and our random thoughts can be quite useful. As for me, I have had a week full of interesting thoughts, some more irrational than others, but mostly I have stumbled upon some topics that I want to write about that I didn’t know I had in me. So let yourself go on that road trip and know that a not so perfect scramble may surprise you and taste better than expected. As with anything, sometimes when things don’t go to plan, maybe the alternative route was the route that was more nourishing after all (and you may even find some chives on top).

What an exciting time?! Everywhere you look, you see or hear thrilling news. Someone has just fallen pregnant, someone else is buying a house, someone is getting married, someone else is getting promoted, and someone else is about to start his dream job. Of course, we are happy for them and celebrate with them, but somehow an uncomfortable feeling starts creeping in. We don’t know the feeling is even there until we have more than one person share their exiting news at the same time. We should be ecstatic, and it is not that we don’t want other people to be happy, we definitely do. So what is this strange, yet familiar feeling that keeps lingering away? Quite possibly, we realise the things that are happening for others is what we want, and they don’t seem to be within reach for us . We feel stuck.

We are doing the same old job that we have always done and don’t particularly like. We are having the same conversations that we have always had and they feel dull. Even when we feel a little inspired and put more effort into work, still, little Johnny is being promoted ahead of us. It seems like life is not going anywhere and it is Groundhog Day all over again. We are unhappy with our life and with where things are at. We think there is no way out. Even if we tried, and really, we have tried with no results, it wouldn’t lead to anything, or so we tell ourselves. And given that our thoughts are already running a bit wild, we decide it is best to invite the thoughts that are seductively dressed up in toxicity to get together to form a little pity party.

‘We are not as good as someone else’ shows up first, followed by ‘We are not as pretty as someone else’. Whilst ‘We are not as successful as others’ was undecided but attended after all because its best friend ‘We are not as smart as others’ wanted to party. Before you know it, it becomes a crowd with guests whose names start with “we are not”. And as much as it sounds like a great party, the guests take up space in our minds that could be filled with more loving thoughts and questions. Feeling stuck is not necessarily bad. Only when we feel that way, do we have an opportunity to look at things on a deeper level. Don’t get me wrong, we do ask questions at these parties, but instead of digging into our soul, we take another sip of the ‘Why do I not get what I really want’ cocktail and get high on the ‘What is wrong with me’ drug. The hangover is much worse and filled with the ‘I am failure’ stench coming out of our pores.

I know that the deep questions are often scary and we don’t always want to go there because the answers may not be something we want to hear. When we feel stuck, we are given a great change to understand ourselves better and question whether the things that we want are truly what we want and why.

Do we want to be promoted because we need to show our friends and family, and especially our peers (take little Johnny), that we have hacked it at work and we are someone? Is it because we give a lot and we need to be adequately compensated for what we do (it is an energy exchange after all)? Or is it a combination?

Why do we not like our job? Is it the tasks itself, only part of the tasks, or is it the co-workers? If it is the co-workers, just running away to another company does not usually solve the issue. The move will create similar situations with similar type people. They may look different but they carry the same energy and we start thinking the same unhelpful thoughts again. I am not suggesting to stay in a toxic environment but it may be worthwhile to evaluate if our co-workers are trying to show us something about ourselves. I do think that some of the people that we interact with hold up a mirror for us and show us something about ourselves. Only when we ask the questions do we know whether it is a toxic environment or someone trying to show us something that we don’t want to see. Let’s say a co-worker keeps lying to us. Is that because the person simply is a liar and this has nothing to do with us, or is it because we also are not honest with ourselves about some aspects of ourselves?

If we are not particularly liking the tasks itself but think they will be better at another company because we get more money and a nicer title, they won’t. We eventually find ourselves in the same situation again. It is probably a good time to ask why we do these jobs in the first place. Are the reasons good enough that we don’t feel like we have a midlife crisis every three weeks? Is it time to look at completely different jobs all together? Maybe there is even a job that is better suited for us within the company or maybe it is time to start our own business in a completely different field.

Why is getting married important to us? Is it because everyone else around us is getting married and we feel pressure that we should get ourselves sorted and also work on our 1.75 kids. Do we want to be married because our parents keep pestering us and so do our friends and it is about time? Is it because we have religious or traditional or other beliefs? Does marriage carry a meaningful value deep inside of us? What does marriage mean to us?

A lot of the issues often arise because we compare ourselves to others. But would you really want to live their life? Maybe little Johnny hates his job and is stressed out and wishes to be in your shoes. Possibly, we don’t get promoted because it gives us the time to work on ourselves and gives us a lot of flexibility that we would not have anywhere else. What if we are already in line for promotion but we block that by being grumpy at work and wanting to party with toxic thoughts. Maybe we are not stuck after all but we tell ourselves.

I don’t think we are ever truly stuck. We have simply been given a chance to check in and ask ourselves tough questions. This is an uncomfortable place, but it is the place where we can grow and get closer to ourselves. Sometimes the answer hurts a little and we work out that we need to make adjustments but other times it is quite uplifting and inspiring. For me, I rather know my truth. This is also a chance to realise all the good things in our life and be grateful for what we do have and focus our energy on that. Practicing a little gratitude often goes a long way because good things want to come our way. Whilst gratitude does not guarantee to get us what we want, having a pity party will most definitely not get us there.

My view for when you feel stuck: Cancel the party, ask yourself some questions and be curious about some of the outcomes of your questioning. Be grateful for what you have and let life bring you more of the goodness. Who knows, you might be surprised. And don’t forget to have fun with it too. You can ask yourself the tough questions whilst being playful with it.

For one of my first articles, I decided to pick procrastination as the topic. I thought this to be a good one because I have been procrastinating for weeks now (maybe even months if I am being really honest), to put articles on my website, let alone just write.

I have found every distraction there is in an attempt to avoid the action of writing. It is not that I failed to set time aside to write. I just found other things to do that seemed more pressing. First, I found myself in a rabbit hole to understand how to get my ‘contact’ page working. This task only takes about 30 minutes but somehow I managed to turn it into a week-long job. Next, I made sure to ramp up my social engagements and even see long-lost friends and to help someone with cooking. Once that was ticked off, I had the urge to learn how to make a lemon tart. I don’t quite know how a lemon tart would be a priority.

Visitors to my house have all commented on how clean my house is. My house is usually quite clean and tidy but for whatever reason it needed to look like some house critic was about to enter and see if I had wiped the dust off the skirting boards. It reminds me of this one time back at University when I found myself vacuum cleaning in the middle of the night in order to avoid writing an essay. Even as I am writing this, I keep going to the fridge in the hope of discovering something that was not there before. Sometimes I wonder if the fridge inspection is the start of a dementia-related issue. Surely, one would remember the contents of the fridge, especially after having closely inspected it at least five times in the last 60 minutes.

Upon reflection, the one action that really struck me was finding distraction in social engagements. Those people that know me well, know that I can be a bit of an introvert. After running around on weekends and on some week nights, I felt somewhat flat. Not because I am not vibing with the people (I sure do, they are my people) but, as any introvert knows, if you are not spending time by yourself to refill your own cup, eventually you feel depleted. I knew that I needed to rest but still I pilled on more, just to ensure I am not getting to my writing.

If you still cannot tell, I am even procrastinating on the topic of procrastination. I just spent four paragraphs on distraction instead of procrastination. So let’s get to it. What is procrastination, why do we do it and what have I come across as useful? Procrastination, as good old Dr Google would say, is “the habit of delaying an important task, usually by focusing on less urgent, more enjoyable, and easier activities instead.” More enjoyable? Vacuum cleaning at 2am does not particularly strike me as more enjoyable but none the less, it happened.

For me, when I procrastinate there are a number of reasons why. I am either uninspired by the task, the task at hand seems too big, I don’t know where to start, I am subconsciously trying to hold myself back, I have to show up fully and show the world who I really am which scares me, and I am also that person that performs better under pressure and with a deadline looming. Whilst all of these play a role at various times and depending on the task, and sometimes it is all of them at once, the one thing that has surfaced as my largest hurdle is perfectionism.

Whatever makes it on the website needs to be perfect, or so I tell myself. Perfectionism can be a real bummer at times and makes a start difficult. In my mind it needs to be perfect from the beginning and every word needs to scream ‘perfect’. In my head the equation goes like this: If it is not perfect, it is not good enough and therefore I am not good enough.

When my good old friend perfectionism rocks up, it often takes me a little while to see that she is floating around. She likes to sneak in through the backdoor whilst I am not watching and before I know it sits on the couch like an uninvited guest who does not want to leave. One time, perfectionism actually stopped me producing some artwork that I was asked to do. Everyone could see how awesome it was going to be but me. I was about 90% there and I decided it was no good. The person who was supposed to receive it even thought it was great at that point, but perfectionism said it wasn’t. This painting never made it to its destination of being hung up in someone’s living room. Instead, it sits in my garage collecting dust, and for good reason. I decided to keep it as a great reminder of how perfectionism can stand in the way of some incredible work.

Perfectionism can also be useful, especially when it comes to having an eye for detail, which is really handy when painting portrait-style art, but when perfectionism takes over, it can be tricky. I have a much better and easier time these days to deal with my perfectionism because of the experience that I had and I value some aspects of perfectionism. It sometimes still happens that perfectionism takes over and it is an evolving relationship but when I realise it is my perfectionism that holds me back, I can quickly move on. Sometimes when perfectionism prevents me from putting my first single word on a blank page, I just put a random word or random sentence there to be playful with it all. If perfectionism stops me in other tasks, I also just start somewhere. Often times somewhere that is as far away from the task as possible but it is simply the habit of starting. Most writers know that a big chunk of what you write does not make it onto the final version, so then why not just start and get on with it?

These days I also set myself deadlines, even for the boring tasks and block out some time to just get it done. The boring tasks are sometimes as important as the meaningful tasks and sometimes the action of just getting things done helps with the more inspiring tasks. Given that I am also someone who performs better with a deadline in sight, having one, even if it is just for myself, greatly assists. A deadline also helps with perfectionism itself. When there is only so much time to do something, perfectionism cannot run freely into every line or even between all the lines, but rather come at the end to do a final check within the time that is given. And whilst perfectionism would tell me it is not right, maybe the very fact that it isn’t perfect is what makes it perfect.

Bottomline for me is to set a deadline, block out some time and just start, even if it is with the most obscure beginning and don’t let perfectionism, a vacuum cleaner, or you yourself stand in your own way.