DAY 1 on the Amazing Adventure . . .

Posted on by Sandy

Yesterday was “Day 1” on the “Amazing Adventure.”

After I did the Ironman in 2010, I promised “The Great Is” that if s/he got me over the line in time (you must finish in less than 17 hours – I was 16:58:51), I would volunteer now and again. I volunteered the next year, because my running “partner” Pukin’ Steve (see previous posts!)’s wife Kathy was doing the race. I had a BLAST. I volunteered again this past Sunday, because she was doing it again – and she got a personal best, though she had broken her big toe in three places, 4 weeks before the event!

(She’s amazing.)

There’s nothing quite like watching first-hand the whole “thrill of victory, agony of defeat” thing to get you going again.

I have gained A LOT of weight in the past while – likely meno-you-know-what (hey, I like to keep thinking I’m 29 years old…so I don’t like to use that word), “good livin'” and all that. I am in the middle of a “diet bet” right now, in fact, and am 14 pounds down from when I started, but I have about 23 to go. Yes, I gave up alcohol, except for the week I was just in Kentucky, and that has helped – but in actuality I gotta get back exercising.

I have done a number of marathons in the past year – Nike, California International, TInkerbell, Vienna (Austria), and am signed up for another one in October – but I’m really pretty much out of shape. I am not fast, I’m just steady. And I haven’t done anything else, so I have pretty good legs, but that’s about it.

For the Amazing Race, that’s gotta change.

However, since I have pretty much been sandbagging on working out since my last marathon a few months ago, I had to get started again. So yesterday, I went to the gym, and walked on the treadmill at 3.5 for 1/2 hour (so about a mile and a half), then did a 750 yard swim (about 1/2 hour). Yes, I told you I was slow.

I walked on the treadmill because I managed to pull a muscle on the inside of my leg when I was in KY, and I wanted to take it slow. No, I didn’t pull it when I was helping out at Ironman – I pulled it when out on the Bourbon Trail. As a friend said, you know how it goes on the Bourbon Trail, as you get farther along it, the floors just seem to get wavier and wavier. Yeah, what he said.

So that’s what I did on Day 1. I did it, I feel good. Today (Day 2) I plan to get the rules of the Amazing Race and post them here. But I gotta split now and get to work.

For Days 1 and 2, I told my friend R – who was fighting this idea – that she could just get us some phrases in two different languages that we might need. So that’s what she’s done. I’ve posted them below. So that’s Day 1 (Swahili) and Day 2 (French) for R.

I will get more creative with pictures, fonts, and all that jazz at some point. But I wanted to get this party started.

Here’s R’s stuff:

DAY ONE: Swahili (50 million speakers in Africa) – phrases we might need:

How do I get to:  Je, ninkwenda

+The bus station:  kytuo/steshen cha basi

+The train station:  kytuo/steshen cha treni

+The airport: Unwanja wa ndeji

Thank you: Asante – Asante sana (sgl) Asanteni (pl)

**A is pronounced “ah” as in father.

**E is pronounced “eh” as in “say” (or like the Canadians exclaiming eh)

**I is pronounced like “ee” as in “see”

**O is “oh” as in “so”

**U is “oo” as in doom

**nd is “en d” both n and d are pronounced. Endayjee

DAY TWO: FRENCH – Approx 29 countries in Africa speak French officially. Phrases we might need:

How do I get to: Comment puis-je obtenir de

+The bus station la station de bus

+The train station la gare

+The airport la aeroport

Thank you Merci

And R’s final comment: “We have to be careful that you’re not the brawn here. LAUGH.”
My answer – if I’m the brawn, we’re SO going to be the first to go. Then again, every reality show needs cannon fodder 😉

What? A post?!?!?!

Posted on by Sandy

Yeah, yeah.

So, after the Ironman way back in 2010, I went on to other things – got a couple more books published, yadda yadda. I also started my blog over on DreamChoosers.com – but that’s more tied to my book Passive Income 101.

It seems fairly unlikely there aren’t any readers here any more, but that’s okay. I am going to be using this more on the “personal diary” side, but you can come along if you want!

A friend of mine who I shall call “R” to protect the guilty asked me now about two years ago if I’d like to be on Amazing Race with her. At the time, I hadn’t heard of Amazing Race. We’ve gone back and forth for a few years (I bet it’s more than two) about this whole thing. First I was injured, then she was, blah blah blah.

I challenged her yesterday that for every day for the next 365 days that we do “something” that will move us along the path towards at least being able to APPLY to The Amazing Race.

So what I’m going to do here, like when I was training for the Ironman back in 2010, is to just keep track of what we’re doing.

I’m going to add a Category of “Amazing Race” but no tags. I don’t think that 300 days or so from now someone could swoop in and just use our page to get themselves ready – but I do know that with my Ironman postings, a lot of folks wrote to me and it ultimately got to the first page of Google if you put in “Ironman” – which I’d rather this didn’t.

So – enough said – here’s to an adventure and to “Team Ruthless”! (I just pestered the crap out of my friend R to commit to doing this, and she just said I was “ruthless” – so I think that’s our team name!)

MLM Due Diligence: Insidious Enticement

Posted on by Sandy

If you’ve been in network marketing for any amount of time, you will have likely come up against the idea of “Enticement.”

“Enticement” is illegal. The standard “enticement” example is showing someone your big wowzah check or super duper weight loss, and making them imagine that your check/weight loss is typical; they can do it without any effort; they can retire in a second; etc.

You can Google “enticement” and “MLM” and get lots of info on this subject.

But there is another sort of “enticement.” It’s all about NOT showing someone your results!

This only works, of course, if it’s about the money. If you are in a weight loss MLM, and you try to tell folks that you lost 100 pounds using your Weight-B-Gonez product while lying on the couch snarfing down fast food, they can look at you over the top of their spectacles and see that, um, NO, you’se lyin’, Porkchop.

When it comes to money, people do it all the time. It’s what I like to call “insidious enticement.”

Let’s say that your sponsor is only making a couple thousand dollars a month (maybe even only a couple of hundred dollars a month!). Now, granted, that might seem like good money to you right now – but perhaps they are “implying” that by “doing what they did/are doing” that you can have an income where you can ‘fire your boss,’ ‘wake up when you’re done sleeping instead of to an alarm,’ ‘live larger,’ and all the rest.

Could you “fire your boss,” if you were making what they are actually making?

When you ask your sponsor or potential sponsor how much they make, how big their “downline” is, how many customers they have, how long they’ve been at this/how many years they’ve been in the business, how many hours they actually work the business (at the beginning, and now), and how much of their $ is tied to their actual “work efforts” versus “residual”/cashflow income, they’ll often clam up, and sagely state: “Oh, it’s ILLEGAL for me to show you my check, or tell you any of that.”

Hogwash. This is still “enticement.” And it’s actually a more insidious kind.

If you ask your sponsor how much he or she makes, I would tend to bet you that they are making a lot LESS than you imagine that they are. If you ask your sponsor to lay out the hours that they work per week, how long they’ve been in the biz, the amount of distributors/customers that they have, their weekly/monthly income, and the “split” between “money for time spent” income (e.g., just like your “job”) and “residual” income (e.g., “money while they’re sleeping”), you can make an educated decision about the choice of this business over another business. It is exactly like “looking at the books” if you were considering purchasing a “bricks and mortar” business.

Granted, it’s not exactly the same as that. They’re not selling you “their” business – as would be the case if you were considering taking over the local Laundromat or hardware store. But by trying to get you into their business, often potential sponsors are misrepresenting the business by what they are not saying.

I sometimes uncharitably think that the reason so many people shout and holler and rail against high dollar earners showing their checks is that they don’t want to show their measly checks!

Interestingly, many folks state that one should not “show a check,” based on the idea that if you’re at your “real job” and standing around the water cooler, folks don’t go around and ask what each other is making. Also, many network marketing professionals state that if “someone is asking what you are making” in an MLM, you “haven’t explained the compensation plan well enough.”

I don’t agree with those statements. First of all, network marketing is supposed to be a level playing field. Unlike the “standing around the water cooler” example, everyone is supposed to be able to get to the same place by doing the same things. You’re just trying to figure out what that really means – which is Due Diligence. Moreover, though it’s true that if you “explain the compensation plan well enough,” your prospect should be able to figure out how to get to the dollar figure they desire, that’s like saying that a bricks-and-mortar establishment “should” make a certain amount based on statistics – not on fact.

And remember – the person that you’re talking to will get paid something for you joining them. They have a vested interest – perhaps in hiding what they “really make” so that you will join them, which will help them make more.

I joined an MLM and did my homework. I asked my sponsor (let’s call him Joe) to run through what his check was, and how he got to the amount he got weekly (for his work efforts in the MLM/recruiting/etc.) and monthly (as “residual income”). Interestingly, my sponsor didn’t really understand the compensation plan, so I wound up going through and explaining where he could make more money by changing where he put his efforts! But I could literally tie the compensation plan, numbers, and the rest together. That MLM changed its compensation plan, and most everyone’s check (mine included!) went down by about 60%. However, folks are still out there touting it as a way to “retire” – as a way to have “5-5-5” income versus “40-40-40.” (“40-40-40” income means you spend 40 hours a week for 40 years at a job, and retire on about 40% of your annual income – “5-5-5” means that you work 5 hours a week for 5 years at an MLM and retire with 5x what you would in a “regular job” – sometimes referred to as 3-3-3 or 7-7-7.)

I think that this is disingenuous.

If you’re already spending a lot of time in a network marketing business and “just can’t figure out” how you’re not able to even come close to “firing your boss,” then make an appointment with your sponsor and get them to “show you the money.” Look at what they are making, and how many distributors they have, how many customers they have, how many hours per week they put into the business . . . in short, do your (belated) due diligence on the business that you’re planning to “retire” on. Get the black and white facts behind what your sponsor is intimating he or she makes. You might be very surprised.

And no, it’s not illegal for them to run through their numbers with you – especially if, in fact, they are making a lot less than their language “hints” that they are making.

If you’re considering entering into a network marketing business (or any business!) then get the facts from the outset. The person that is talking to you about the business might be new at it themselves. If that’s the case, they can show you the compensation plan, show you what they plan to do, and show you how they believe it will make money, given the comp plan. But if they are not new at it, then there are facts and figures that you can actually look at (just like for a “regular” business!) to help you make your decision. If they are making a ton of dough (I’m telling you – they’re probably not), then be sure that you ask for the FAQ from their MLM that will state the “average” income of someone at their level in the business. Every MLM is required to make this information public.

But if they’re not making a ton of dough, then at least you know the truth before you proceed.

I still personally believe in network marketing/MLM as the best way for a “regular person” to get a business going, and to learn and understand how to run a business. It’s also the business that has made the most millionaires out of regular people without any special background. But I’m just tired of how many people seem to be out there hooting and hollerin’ about how great their business is – and then, when asked for the particulars, hide behind the “enticement” banner.

Perhaps MLM is right for you – perhaps the one you’re already in. Perhaps a different one.

Perhaps it’s not worth the time and effort to you, once you really get the facts and figures.

Perhaps you love the products so much, that a little money tied to introducing others to those products is super.

Great. But just remember one thing . . . get the real facts. Don’t take someone’s hyperbole for truth – especially when that “hyperbole” is them hiding the ball from you, telling you they “can’t” (as the old movie goes) Show You The Money.

It’s just as much of an “enticement” to talk big about something that isn’t really that big than it is to show something big that isn’t the average experience.

Enough said.

It’s time for a Spring Clean!!

Posted on by Sandy

Spring cleaning can be totally overwhelming – but there’s a systematic way to go about it. The second Chapter of my book fEmpowerment: A Guide to Unleashing Your Inner Bond Girl (and the companion Playbook) has over 70 pages of more detail than I can go into here – but hopefully this article will give you a start!

First of all, you need to make a contract with yourself to go through every single drawer, cabinet, nook and cranny of your house, purse, office, etc. this month or next. (OH NO, says you! OH YES, says me!) It’s important to touch every single thing in your space, and be sure you love all of it. Block off chunks in your calendar for 30 days in a row. You probably won’t need all of them – but you need to block in that immovable time, just in case. I’ve outlined Calendaring in a previous post…and when I say “make a contract” I really mean print something out with a date on it, and sign it. Be accountable. (I’ve written about that here, too!)

As an aside, I’d like to share that I read an article that if you sort while listening to music that you can actually sing to, it will be easier and you’ll be more ruthless. Why? When I was in the Marine Corps, they taught us that in an “emotional” (read: frightening) situation, if you sing words to a tune, it keeps both hemispheres of the brain occupied, so you don’t have “room in your head” to be scared. If you just hum, you still have your left hemisphere coming up with “fearful words” for you – if you just speak, your right hemisphere will conjure up fearful pictures. My guess is that when doing sorting, it’s probably the same. Your emotions don’t kick in so much when you hit an item that you know you need to get rid of, but still feel tied to (example: A stained, ill-fitting blouse that you wore at a special event).  So crank up some tunes, and sing, sing, sing!

If you have kids, and/or a partner, have them help out, and make it Fun. The goal here, remember, is to touch everything. Anything that hasn’t been used or loved in the last year goes in a pile on the floor. If you’re working with kids, this is a great way to teach them about Charity – reminding them how Wealthy they are, and how Wealth has nothing to do with what they have in their closets. Materialism in children is taught and encouraged, or at the very least allowed, by parents. It’s better to have one truly loved teddy bear than a bunch of beautiful but dust-gathering dolls, games, and as they grow up, shoes, T-shirts, and the like. (Did they learn that from you…?) If you teach your kids that their Wealth is their awesome selves, then maybe the house will be a little less cluttered, and your bank account a little less strapped. (Consign, consign, consign!) And the way to start is by you taking on this reality first, then expanding it to those you love.

It’s usually easiest to start in the kitchen or bathroom. There is always a bunch of stuff in cabinets that you bought but didn’t eat or use. Do you really want to put that in/on your (or your kids’) body? Get it all out of your cabinets and if an item is not open, it needs to go to a local shelter. Right now, shelters are in such tough straits… I recently took some foodstuffs in that were open, but they still took them gratefully. And when you re-stock, be SURE to either circle the “sell by” date, or put the date you purchased the item on it. (I keep laundry markers in my kitchen/bathroom for just this purpose.)

The same goes for herbs and spices, flour, condiments, vitamins, and cosmetics. Everything loses its vitality over a certain amount of time – and if the flour in your cupboard was from making a batch of brownies before you were married, it’s gotta go! Purchase things as you need them. A great way to do this is to snap a photo on your phone of a recipe’s ingredients list, then purchase just that amount of each ingredient from the bulk bins at your local store. As you likely know, Whole Foods has just about every herb and spice you could want in bulk.

Now, someone is sure to say, “But, we need to have 20 days’ worth of canned goods in case there is an earthquake/flood/what-have-you.” If that’s really why you have a pile of soup gathering dust in the back of your closet, I still ask you – when did you buy it? Do you really want to be eating something out of a can that you bought two years ago (and was probably canned way before that)? Eee-yew. Keeping enough for 20 days means cycling through that food. Remember – when you take all those random items to the shelter or charity, get a receipt – it’s deductible! (and ItsDeductible.com is a fabulous free place to keep track of all these items for next year’s taxes.)

If you are sorting through your cosmetics, be particularly aware that the “open life” is no more than three months. So if you have an unopened wand of mascara in there, it’s likely still good – if you have one you opened and only used once, not so much. Lotions are particularly susceptible to air. Once again, I date these items with a laundry marker to keep myself honest.  Marin Abused Women’s Services takes all unused makeup, shampoo, samples and the like with great gratitude. (And while we’re at it, Humane Societies want old newspapers, veterinarians want old towels and sheets . . .  there are lots of these tricks in my book J )

If there are items that you just don’t believe you can get rid of but don’t need “right now,” put them in a garbage bag and staple it closed, putting a date a year from today on it. If you haven’t opened it by then …pitch it without opening it! If you reach in and get one thing in that year, fine – but no fair re-dating the whole bag by virtue of using that one thing!

When you put things away, there are lots of tricks – too much to go into here. Like putting all the matching linens in your closet into one of the pillowcases, giving you “pillow packs” with all the matching linens together. Or turning the hangars around in your closet and re-hanging them “the right way” only after you’ve worn the item. This will make Spring Cleaning next year a snap. You won’t be able to lie to yourself about when you bought or whether you’ve used an item. It will all be dated, turned-around, or the like.

Sometimes it’s hard to get our men to do this adventure with us. Men often have “trophies” of “bygone days” in the house. You may, too. Do you have books that you read in college, trophies from sports you don’t play any more, photographs that you don’t really see? In general, this is “indirect bragging.” Do you have books in your bookshelf so that people will look at them and say “ohhh, loooook, she is so smart.” I had a friend who had a number up on her fridge, for a race that she actually did not run! It’s tough, but if you’ve got this as part of your clutter makeup, it’s time to stop living in the past, and start living in the present instead. (And stop the bragging – it’s unbecoming.) While you’ll hopefully have luck enlisting your family in this project, remember – you’re not doing it for them. That will just lead to all sorts of drama!

I’ll just leave you with one example of how to get the right mindset to get this done.  Let’s pretend that your honey came up to you and says, “Hey gorgeous woman, light of my life, I want to pack all our stuff up, and move to Buenos Aires for six months. [Or Paris, or Cinqueterre, or New York, or…] We just need to bring our essentials, then pack up what we want to get back into when we come home.” Take a breath, and imagine this. (And while you’re at it, listen to any excuses that your inner Fear-Thrower comes up with and shoot them down: It’s going to be fine with your kids’ soccer coach, your boss, your mom, or whomever else.)

The point of this exercise? Storage is expensive – as is shipping your stuff off to Argentina. So you have to divide up all your things with that in mind. First, pack the stuff you can’t live without for six months. Remember though – you are going to a fully-furnished house. Next, pack up everything you’re going to put into storage because you won’t need it for six months, but you’ll definitely not be able to live without it when you get back. Then, get rid of the rest.

Okie dokie, so now imagine you’re in Argentina doing the tango with your honey, and you find out that the storage unit was hit by an earthquake, and only half of your stuff survived. What are you super hopeful made it?

You see what I’m getting at. If you envision this exercise, and start going through your house this way, you’ll find stuff that wouldn’t have even made it to the storage unit. Clothes that aren’t fashionable/are stained/don’t fit; pictures you never look at; books you’ve read; toys your kids have outgrown. After that comes stuff you want to keep (so it went to the storage unit), but it really isn’t irreplaceable or necessary. Books you loved and want to re-read “some day”; furniture; ribbons from races; old toys; pots and pans. You didn’t want to pitch it, but in the end, it’s OK that it’s gone (though a little painful). Next there is stuff that actually is irreplaceable – the stuff you hope the earthquake left. Scrapbooks; your grandmother’s silver; a particular drawing by your child; a favorite sculpture.

And remember, you have with you what you believed to be Necessary for six months. Perhaps your grandmother’s antique brooch and her recipe for butterbeans; clothes you love; toys your kids love and play with…you get the picture.

You know what I’m going to say now, right? You have to be ruthless about anything that’s not irreplaceable or necessary/loved. I know it’s painful, but everything else is either silent bragging or extra dusting.  Granted, things like pots and pans and furniture are necessary – but how necessary? Do you really only use two pots and one pan? Why do you have 20 then?

And if you have things someone else would love – give them away! It’s a huge charge to do this. Either physically give a friend something she’s admired, or do what my husband and I have done – we have a big “gift bookshelf” in our atrium with things we love to see but ultimately want to part with. People are shocked when we make them “take something with them” when they leave. If something means too much to you to go to a nameless recipient at a charity – then give it to a recipient with a name, instead!

Everything in your space should be at its “highest and best use.” For example, if you have an antique violin that no one plays and is in good shape, what about donating it to an orchestra, then going to hear it? If you have something you ”can’t” get rid of because it was given to you, offer it back. The funniest part of this is that often the giver doesn’t want it either – but that allows you to move it along to its “next best use” without feeling guilty! It only gets harder with time – I had birthday cards from my grandfather in a box – just a card with his signature – and it was a lot harder to throw them away because he has passed on than to throw out birthday cards I received from friends this year.  You don’t want this to be the situation with the “monstrosity” armoire that you and your husband haven’t “figured out” how to give back to your mother! Just do it. Once she’s gone, it will be next to impossible.

My Dad once said to me that you can’t fill your glass with champagne if there’s beer in there. Spring cleaning is the time to pour the beer out, clean the glass… and allow the “stuck” energy from items that are just taking up space circulate to their next best use, leaving room for new, fabulous energy!

 

Cheers!

Accountability!!!!

Posted on by Sandy

Below is a “down and dirty” video about my Fempower(R) accountability process!

It’s based on the SendOutCards Daily 8. I did it in my actual office. I show you my actual process. Not edited…I did say “down and dirty” right?

Three team members have asked me about this in the last few days – so I thought I’d show what I talk about! I hope that this will motivate you to try it – having a system is a huge part of getting things done!

Take a look…

Start 2013 fast, focused and fired up!!!

Posted on by Sandy

Consider the implication of this idea…

What would happen if I were to follow you with a camera crew 24 hours a day 7 days a week for the first 100 days of 2013 while you went for your goals?

I bet 3 things would happen….

1) You would START doing the things you say you need to do.

2) You would STOP doing the things you know you shouldn’t be doing.

3) You would MAKE monumental performance gains and have the best year of your life.

How this possible?

Through the power of accountability!

Accountability serves to protect your character, as well as your credibility, and more importantly, it helps you to accomplish all of your goals.

THE #1 thing that stops people from accomplishing their goals is their lack of accountability.

Without accountability, you’re highly vulnerable, easily distracted, and if not corrected, you’ll quickly become competitive toast.

So, how can someone that wants accountability get it, without paying thousands and thousands of dollars for a coach?

Good question. Here is your answer:

Gary Ryan Blair, otherwise know as “The Goals Guy” has put together what I believe to be the most comprehensive form of accountability, goal setting and performance enhancement, that I have ever seen.

Why do I say that? Because I paid to be part of it, myself! Then I thought (after the first few days) that it’s really too good not so share.

It’s called the 100 Day Challenge, and when you check out the following link, you’ll you’ll learn how to create mind-blowing  results in 2013.

http://www.goalsguy.com/Affiliate/tgg.php?id=1036507

I’ve seen it, and it’s an amazing piece of work. Best of all, as I said, I’m buying it, and I’m doing it! (I’m on Day 6.) But you don’t have to take my word for it, check it out for yourself here:

http://www.goalsguy.com/Affiliate/tgg.php?id=1036507

Are you ready to start 2013 fast, focused and fired up!?!

Then check it out!

Isn’t it your turn…??

Ready…Fire…Aim!

Posted on by Sandy

Yeah, I meant that. How many of us live our lives like this?

You get prepared to do something. Ready.

Then you Fire – and your shot goes way off target.

And so then you Aim, and get a little closer, Fire! Still off. You Aim again…Fire!

Why do we work this way, instead of Ready, Aim, Fire?

Because getting Ready is action. And Firing is action. And Aiming involves thinking, meditating, planning, being calm, breathing (read: inaction). But it’s the crucial step.

So when you’re looking at your dreams, get yourself ready, BUT before you Fire (quitting your job, for example) – Aim.

Take a look at where you want to be, get a bead on it, think about it, plan, breathe, be calm, check the wind, check the weather. Be a sniper. Knock down that Dream the first time. You do not want to take an unaimed pot-shot at it, which is going to make it jump up and run farther away like a little bunny, and alert everyone else around you who might want to do a little sabotage!

– From Fempowerment: A Guide To Unleashing Your Inner Bond Girl, by Sandy Shepard

Manta Ray Ballet: Snorkeling with manta rays in Kona, Hawaii

Posted on by Sandy

I’m not going to say much – I’m going to let this video speak for itself.

Suffice it to say, though, that this is not a “professional” video – it was taken with a Samsung handheld underwater camera from the surface of the water by lil’ ole me.

Thank you…

*to Sunlight On Water for leading the manta ray snorkeling dive. They told me you were the best – that’s an understatement.

*to my “West Bengal Tiger” Prashant Saha (prashant.kol01@gmail.com) for the AMAZING editing (45 minutes down to this!).

Also thank you to . . .

*Samsung for their W200 HD PocketCam underwater camera.

*The following musicians, who graciously offered their work for free download:

GlowWorm – a 2-man outfit from Portland, Oregon

Yuki Murata – from Japan

Cold Womb Descent – two astronomers influenced by observing astral creations and clouds of cosmic dust.

Oh – and of course – to “The Great Is” for the manta rays.

 

I’m Thankful For…Things Going Wrong?

Posted on by Sandy

Wow, what a great photo, right? It’s one of the bars at The Standard Hotel, New York. H and I had the most amazing evening here. But it almost didn’t happen.

We had tickets to do an evening dinner sail around New York – spent a pretty penny for it, too. But we mis-timed getting to the dock…and did see the boat… just as it turned to sail into the beautiful sunset.

I was beside myself. After (mumble mumble) years of marriage, you’d think I would know that my husband is terrible at keeping to a timetable. He’s the standard Absent-Minded Professor type – and if you’ve married one sister, you know what I’m talking about. You also know that you can’t get mad at him if time-related things go sideways . . . because let’s face it, the time-space continuum just don’t work the same way for him as it does for you. (Okay, I know that perhaps you want to blame him when thing go sideways – or you want him to “be different” – but that’s not how it works. **Shameless Plug Alert*** You might want to pick up my book Fempowerment: A Guide To Unleashing Your Inner Bond Girl on Amazon.com if you need a little refresher in this area).

So back to us, dressed up, watching the boat sail bye-bye. I was “stomping my feet with little tears in my eyes” mad – because not only did I want to go, but also it had cost a lot and – hey – who has enough bucks to basically throw them into the Hudson and watch them as they swirl slowly to the murky depths?

When things go wrong – don’t go with them. Elvis Presley

My husband was a lot more philosophical about it. (Probably because I was suitably upset for the two of us.) He reminded me that we’d wanted to check out the High Line – an old elevated train line from the ’30s that had been turned into a park on the West Side. He pulled out his trusty iPhone, figuring it must be close, because we were on the West Side. Sure enough – there was an entrance stairway a couple blocks away.

So there we were, up on the High Line in our evening-going-yachting outfits, walking along, taking in a very cool park that has been turned through labors of love into an amazing public park. (If you haven’t ever seen or been there – check out the website.)

Part of the line actually goes through buildings – the original High Line was built to get freight trains off of Manhattan’s busy West Side streets (Meatpacking District, etc.). We figured that some of these had originally been freight way stations. When walking through one of the buildings, we looked up – and saw the bar that you can see in the first photo above – but it was far, far up on the very top floor.

We were intrigued.

We got down off the High Line, trying to figure out how to get into the building. All the windows were uniform, so we figured it was either a condo complex (with a great meeting room up top) or a hotel. The Standard isn’t big on outside advertising…in fact, the front door is blocked by a huge sculpture of a black and white cartoon-ish clown with his hands over his eyes.

When things go wrong, you’ll find they usually go on getting worse for some time; but when things once start going right they often go on getting better and better. – C.S. Lewis

There is a whole story about getting into the bar – the very VERY cool elevators (as you go up, an animated “scene” a la Alice In Wonderland changes slowly as if you were in a hot air balloon rising over it) – the “secret” roof  bar – and watching the sun set over New Jersey. I’ll tell you all about it some time.

But this is the key.

The key is that without making the mistake – missing the boat, literally – we would not have gone to The Standard. And now I’ve recommended it to a few friends, and each and every one of them has said it was the highlight of their trip to Manhattan – as it was for us.

Because we missed the boat.

I remember going to a Suze Orman seminar once, where Suze said that anything bad that happens has an equal and opposite good thing that happens because of it. This was about 20 years ago and she was mainly talking about money (being Suze Orman), but I remember it to this day. She also said that if you’re in the “thick” of the bad thing happening, you will never be able to believe the truth of that statement – but if you find something bad – REALLY bad – at least three years in your past, you will be able to see that it actually led to something far greater and better happening.

Things don’t go wrong and break your heart so you can become bitter and give up. They happen to break you down and build you up so you can be all that you were intended to be. – Samuel Johnson

When I was at that seminar, I remember thinking that there was no way that this was true with respect to what I considered the “low part” of my life. Back in the early ’90s, I discovered that my long-term, live-in boyfriend had not only run up one of the credit cards I had as a “reserve” with a big limit (I of course thought the balance was zero – he had run it up and was paying the minimums, and would get the mail out of the mailbox before I saw it), but I also unexpectedly found out that he had been having affairs for years. Then when I tried to kick him out, he refused to go, and ultimately got us both kicked out  – ruining my credit and throwing me back to living with my folks for a year.

I had found out the credit thing because things were rocky with him and I’d put a down payment on my own place, figuring I would have the ability to just melt away once I had my own digs – and the credit report showed this enormous $30k debt I knew nothing about, which meant it was impossible for me to secure a mortgage. After a little digging, it all came’a tumblin’ down.

So I was sitting there in that Suze Orman seminar, thinking “No way did anything good come of that.” But it had been over three years . . . and I started thinking.

Blogging about the experience (yes, I was blogging in the early ’90s) got the attention of a publisher – who wound up turning my blog into a book (as referenced above. Did I say shameless plug?) The house I was going to buy turned out to be a Money Pit – and I found one that was a lot better. And…relationships being what they are…had I not found this out, I might still be trying to “work it out’ with totally the wrong guy – instead of happily married to my Mr. Difficult But Definitely Mr. Right absent-minded professor.

So what’s the point?

I think that often we shake our fists and curse and stomp around when things go wrong. Or there is the ever useful habit of blaming the “circumstances” on something else – our spouse, the weather, the economy, the traffic, … whatever. If you’re doing that, Look. You need to pull on your big girl panties and realize that whatever is in your Life is there because you got it there. Do you remember high school geometry? How the tiniest little deviation in a “vector” away from a straight line can, after enough time, become a whopping huge deviance from the original path? Is that what’s happened? Trace it back – somehow, somewhere, even something as innocuous as missing a train (seen Sliding Doors?) might have put you where you are today.

But even once you realize that, as hard as it may seem, it’s time to give Thanks for it – and move on. Because there is an incredible energetic resonance from Gratitude. I once read that the one thing that everyone wants to be is to Be Seen. When you give Gratitude in a trying time, you open up the way for the good that “will come” from that bad (or “lesson”) to flow to you.

Sound new-agey? Not so. This is actually part of what quantum physics is about. It’s a very odd world, quantum physics. It’s being proven every day that the “higher the vibrational frequency” of an emotion (appreciation/thankfulness/gratitude being very high on the list), the more of it you attract to you when you concentrate on it.

So how to celebrate that gratitude? Another SHAMELESS PLUG alert – I’m sponsoring a 30 Day Gratitude Challenge – you can go to TakeItTeachIt.com and check it out, or contact me and I will give you the details. If you’re in the middle of a “bad time” just doing this Challenge daily won’t change your Life…until about Day 14. (smile)

Will concentrating on Gratitude turn problems into gifts, failures into successes, the unexpected into perfect timing? Actually, yes, if you give it enough time.

Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow. — Melodie Beattie

Being grateful for what you have, you generally get more of the same. Though this might sound like I am touting the PollyAnna Principle, you can see it very quickly in dealing with, for example, dogs or young children. If your child or pet does something right, you say Thank You, act delighted, and otherwise show them that you See Them and you Appreciate Them (you do, don’t you?). They will make note of how they made you feel towards them. And they will have the intention of doing the same again, to bring about that same feeling.

Similarly, if you do not show gratitude – then that person will not feel Seen. You do not “incentivize” them to act that way around you again.

Sure. You “mean” to do this, but you don’t have time, or hey, what about your life and them seeing you and all you do for them? Believe it or not – if you “go first” and start practicing this, it will absolutely come back to you, as the Scriptures say, tenfold. And you do have a Choice, you know. You can come from a place of misery, or from a place of positivity. Perhaps this is the question to ask – Would you want to be around you?

Be thankful for the challenges and obstacles. Even if you can’t feel positive about them in the thick of things, remember that these are learning opportunities, and do your best not to wallow in self-pity. Because things will change. And when it does change, are you going to be stuck with people remembering how you reacted “last time”? If you are blaming everything on your husband, for example, and then your husband and you “make up,” will your girlfriends think that you’re “crazy” to be with such an “awful” person as him? Interestingly, there was once a psychological study that showed that even once someone had been shown that their position is incorrect, they will dig in their heels and support it well beyond when they should “logically” give it up – because no one wants to be “wrong” or “embarrassed.” Be thankful for it – and move on. Better yet – don’t come from a place of misery and looking for sympathy. I have a whole Chapter in my book on that, too.

“When flowing water meets with obstacles on its path, a blockage in its journey, it pauses. It increases in volume and strength, filling up in front of the obstacle and eventually spilling past it….” — I Ching.

So, what are you going to be thankful for today? It doesn’t have to be a big thing. It can be a beautiful sunset, the smile of someone passing you in the Mall, or the opportunity that you are being handed to pick yourself up one more time, to the astonishment of your adversaries.

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful. — Buddha

And don’t forget to live in the Present – be aware of the abundance in this current moment. Take stock of your feelings – and see if you can move them up to a higher vibrational level. If you’re completely Overwhelmed right now, you’re not going to move up to Joy in one leap. Wait one second, and instead of plowing forward and Doing, work on your Feelings. What’s a higher vibration than Overwhelm? You might move up to….say….Jealousy. Check out Abraham-Hicks Emotional Guidance Scale  – and work on getting one or two emotions up the list.

Last but not least – look for the opportunity to give thanks…look for a hint that your prayers have been heard, and give thanks for it. I remember reading in Dan Brown’s book Angels And Demons that “All prayers are answered – sometimes the answer is ‘No’.” So be thankful that you are on the path to your dreams – it just might be a slightly different path than the one you expected. Give up on “expectations” – they just weigh you down anyway – and go for the Gratitude. It works every time.

Whatever it is you are feeling is a perfect reflection of what is in the process of becoming.
— Abraham Hicks

You get exactly what you are FEELING.
— Abraham Hicks

I am grateful for you 🙂