September 2010
20 posts
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“At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet.”
– Plato
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Task #21 Desrcibe an event in your life when you...
I love the feel of things, the texture, the tempature, the sense of energy inherent in the thing I touch. Spend some time to day really focused on your sense of touch. Notice how things feel, like the tickle of the space created between the keyboard keys as your fingers glide across the keys.
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“All the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill the history books,...”
– Moliere
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Task #20 Dance
Dance (even if you think don’t know how to dance) move to the rythm in your head, feel the music (even if there is none), do it in your living room (or wherever you desire). Dance for at least 30 minutes.
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“The chess board is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the...”
– Thomas Henry Huxley
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Task #19 Question the game of life
What set of rules are you playing the game of life by? Did you choose the rules you’re working to or did you just accept the ones given to you by other people like your parents, elders etc? How can you win a game if you don’t know what the rules are?
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“The whole secret of existence is to have no fear. Never fear what will become of...”
– Buddha
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Task #18 Do something that scares you
One of the three guardians at the gate to any new adventure is fear. Fear can stop us cold. Fear isn’t a bad thing. It’s our bodies way of helping us prepare for a potential situation. Fear only becomes a problem when it’s an imagined fear that has no basis other than what we conjure up in our heads. But it feels so real that we fail to act because of it. Do something scary...
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“When you dance, your purpose is not to get to a certain place on the floor....”
– Wayne Dyer
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Task #17 What legacy do you want to leave: how do...
I’ve been thinking and talking a lot about life purpose lately. One of the questions still floating in my mind is do we need a life purpose beyond the obvious of staying alive and surviving? I’m on the fence with this one. I’m not convince we have to have a life purpose. Perhaps what drives us in search of a life purpose is our need to feel that our life has meaning.
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“A young man without ambition is an old man waiting to be.”
– Steven Brust
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Task #16 If you could be more ambitious in only...
I have only just started playing around with the word ambition. It has a certain, power, a certain driving energy behind it that compells you to act. Having an ambition is like having a supercharged goal you actively want to pursue beyond all costs. Just having goals is not good enough. Goals tend linger without ambition. Add some ambition to your goals and watch them ignite.
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“Passion rebuilds the world for the youth. It makes all things alive and...”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Task #15 Remember something or somebody you...
Did you get the prize? If so was it worth it? If not do you regret it?
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“A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.”
– Charles Darwin
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Task #14 Tell your story in a poem
Joseph Campbell wrote that mythology is the study of mankind’s one great story and that our search is is to find our place in the drama. Mythology is the playground of the muses, the inspirers of art, the inspirers of poetry. If we view life as a poem and see ourselves participating in a poem, we will fill in accord with our universal self. Tell your story in the form of a poem, make it a...
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“Nothing would be done at all if man waited until he could do it so well that no...”
– Cardinal Newman
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Task #13 Just begin
What have you been putting off starting? Don’t wait for tomorrow to come, start it today. Begin with a small step, anything that get’s you going, moving toward doing the thing you’ve been telling yourself you will do one day. If you’re not careful, one day will never come.
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“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our...”
– Buddha
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Task #12 Let go of all of your thoughts and...
You can’t control your thoughts only your responses to them. If you try to suppress them you will attach significance to them and become distracted with the result that your thoughts will control you.
August 2010
22 posts
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“I sought myself.”
– Heraclitus
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Task #11 How do you know when you know yourself?
It’s natural to ask the question “Who am I?” People go on a quest to find themselves all the time. Great that you are going on the perennial quest for self, but do you know what you are looking for? Indeed, how will you know when you have found yourself?
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“Can I ask you a question?”
– Socrates
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Task #10 What questions have you been asking...
The character Yossarian in Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 was described as a collector of good questions which he used to wring knowledge out of people. But his superiors always tried to shut him up whenever he began to ask questions. They felt “there was no telling what people might find out once they felt free to ask whatever question they wanted to.” They thought questions were...
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“A single rose can be my garden… a single friend, my world.”
– Leo Buscaglia
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Task #9 Ask a friend: "What is best about me being...
Aristotle wrote that friendship is a single soul dwelling in two bodies. You can learn a lot about yourself through the company you keep.
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“Even the world’s greatest marksman cannot hit the target if he...”
– Unknown
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Task #8 What is your paradigm about life?
A paradigm is model of how we believe things to be (doesn’t mean it’s true) just that it’s our worldview, and it’s true for us. Your worldview, of course, determines how you experience the world. For instance, a person who holds the view that “Life is a breeze” is going to experience life totally different from someone who holds the view that “Life is a...
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“The torch of chaos and doubt - this is what the sage steers by.”
– Chuang Tzu
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Task #7 Roll the Dice
In honor of the Dice Man and to embrace the randomness of life, let’s dice. Roll a pair of dice. If you roll a: 1 or 7 = go to work (or any place you habitual go via the same route) a new way 2 or 8 = a week without TV 3 or 9 = alter your environment 4 or 10 = break a bad habit 5 or 11 = help a total stranger 6 or 12 = reflect on what really bugs you and do something about it
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“A life without adventure is likely to be unsatisfying, but a life in which...”
– Bertrand Russell
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Task #6 Write about the first time you went away...
At 17, I left home to take on the world and I have never looked back. For me it was a Hero’s Journey. I was crossing the threshold to answer the Call to Adventure. Perhaps these days I am not so much wanting to take on the world as I am wanting to understand the world and the people in it and how we are all interconnected.
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“Don’t underestimate the value of doing nothing, of just going along,...”
– Pooh’s Little Instruction Book
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Task# 5 Find a park bench, sit and observe life
Slow down and enjoy life. If you go too fast you may miss the scenery and forget where you are going and why.
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“Humankind cannot bear very much reality.”
– T. S. Eliot
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Task# 4 If you had to note down the key features...
Morpheus tells Neo that he has been living in a dreamworld, that his reality is concealed behind the wool that has been pulled over his eyes to hide the fact that he is a slave, held in place by a prison that he cannot see, hear, taste or touch - a prison for his mind. But it’s ok you say. It’s only a movie. Consider this: “Modern consumer soceity runs on a simple principle. ...
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“You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.”
– Abraham Lincoln
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Task #3 Take responsibility for every thing you...
Taking responsibility for all that you do or fail to do is the first step toward being an active participant in life and liberating yourself from the “victim” mentality that may be holding you back. Take responsibility and a world full of possibilities open up to you. As Robert L. Spencer writes in The Craft of the Warrior: “At present you only know reality through your...
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“Clocks slay time… time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by...”
– William Faulkner
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Task #2: Ditch your watch
We have allowed ourselves to become slaves to our clocks. Just glancing around my room right now, I have no less than 9 devices displaying the time. There is a reason for our indentured servitude to clocks. It has to do with switching from ‘religious’ time to ‘merchant time’ and adopting the notion “that time is money,” an insidious phrase unleashed on us by...
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“Life is a lively process of becoming. If you haven’t added to your interests...”
– General Douglas MacArthur
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Task: Ask yourself: am I in direction or in...
In other words, are you super busy doing stuff, but not necessarily getting anywhere; or does all of your activity move you closer to where you want to go.