I was inspired for this entry to do an audio message on inspiration. May you be inspired as you listen!
Click below to listen to message:
Janae Bower is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant. She founded Finding IT, a company that specializes in personal and professional development getting to the heart of what matters most.
I recently provided a training on Supervising Millenials. We discussed whether in our digitally driven life we are becoming more attention deficit that in previous eras. There are so many opportunities to be distracted- such as reading interesting blogs! If you feel you must answer that email, text or IM immediately, you may want to examine how cluttered your life and/or your brain is.
Huge chunks of time are wasted over the course of a day by switching from one task to the next. It takes mental energy, and time, moving from one activity to the next. I’ve read it takes anywhere from 15 seconds to 2 minutes to regain your thoughts after an interruption. Pay attention to how much time you may be wasting switching back and forth between tasks. You can take control of your time and your energy by uncluttering your life. In many cases you can decide whether to let the phone ring into voice mail. Same goes for answering an email message or IM. Regardless of your generation, Millenial or otherwise, the essential point is that YOU CHOOSE what you focus on.
What brings you peace? Have you been able to still your mind? Do you want to?
A few bold companies are claiming one day a week where people cannot answer emails (and presumably can’t IM or text). That day is spent in conversation, reflection, planning etc. It’s time out that can create opportunities for new ideas to emerge, relationships to strengthen, or general rejuvenation and renewal for the brain. There’s research that suggests that our greatest breakthroughs or “Aha’s” happen when our brains are in slower brain waves, such as when we are just waking up or in the shower in the morning.
Here are some simple suggestions for finding some peace and stillness in the midst of your work day:
Quietness by Rumi
Become the sky.
Take an axe to the prison wall.
Escape.
Walk out like somebody suddenly born into color.
Do it now.
You are covered with the thick cloud.
Slide out the side. Die,
and be quiet. Quietness is the surest sign
that you have died.
Your old life was a frantic running
from silence.
The speechless full moon
comes out now.
Linda is an author, speaker, coach, and consultant. Go to her website www.lindajferguson.com to read more about her work, view video clips of her talks, and find out more about her book “Path for Greatness: Spirituality at Work” available on Amazon.
What perfect timing it is for me to write this blog entry on happiness. I just came back tonight from an event for women alumni sponsored by the university I attended for both my undergraduate and graduate degree – the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota – and met one of the author’s of the newly-released book What Happy Women Do: A Salute to Sisterhood and the Rituals That Sustain Us. Dr. Carol Bruess is a wonderful example of a “happy woman” as she has found joy in sharing her work.
I’m always attracted to books on happiness because just like the great philosopher Aristotle said that happiness is the goal of all goals. “To be happy” is often the answer you’ll hear to the questions asked about what’s most important to you or what do you want most from life. So what does it mean to be truly happy? And how can we bring happiness to our work?
I’ve read a lot about this subject and have presented on it as well. A couple of my favorite resources I’ll share with you, like the society of happy people. A scientific perspective on happiness that really resonates with me and many other happiness experts out there is the work of Sonja Lyubomirsky in her book The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want.
Her scientific research demonstrates that we all have a happiness set point and the ability to determine about 40% of our happiness. According to Lyubomirsky, 50% of our happiness is determined from our genetic make up, 10% from our circumstances and then the other remaining 40% is up to us! While I’ve been wired with a happiness gene, I’ve also chosen to learn about and practice being happy.
Marci Shimoff’s book Happy for No Reason: 7 Steps to Being Happy from the Inside Out is another wonderful resource on happiness. One of the things she stressed is that happiness is something you have to be intentional about and practice. Just like you can’t expect to be a master pianist without dedicated practice, you can’t expect to master happiness without consistently making concentrated efforts.
I love Shimoff’s concept of having happiness habits. Being happy is a choice and a habit that each of us has the opportunity to make each day. I’ve been starting my daily affirmations with this beginning phrase, “I’m so grateful and happy….” Every time I say the word happy, it physically makes me smile, which in turn helps me feel more happy. I heard once that it takes many more muscles in your face to frown than it does to smile. Smiling to me is one outside indicator of happiness. Lasting happiness however needs to come from the insideout. Shimoff describes being happy for no reason as “an inner state of peace and well-being that doesn’t depend on our circumstances. It’s just an inner backdrop that you carry with you. Rather than trying to extract happiness from your life, you bring your happiness to all of your experiences.
One of her happiness habits from the heart is to spread loving kindness. “You’re your heart flows in love, you naturally feel happier. You can restart you heart’s flow by sending lovingkindness to anyone and everyone you meet.” After hearing about this concept, I’ve been intentionally practicing this throughout the day. When people are working or walking down the street I will look at them in the eyes, smile and silently send lovingkindness from my heart to theirs. I’ll never know if this makes them happier with my positive energy and love flowing their way, but it sure does make me feel happy doing it!
What happiness habits will you practice at your workplace?
Janae Bower is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant. She founded Finding IT, a company that specializes in personal and professional development getting to the heart of what matters most.
I’d like to continue the theme from Janae’s post last week on gratitude, to explore more applications at work and highlight three ways it works.
Focusing on What you Have
For starters, gratitude gets your minds off of all the things that worry you, annoy you, or challenge you. Instead, when you focus your attention on all that you have in your life, you channel your focus on all the ways you are blessed and supported.
I’ve done meditations where I listed all the things that work in my house - that keep me comfortable and cozy- water for my shower, electricity, my warm bed, plumbing and pipes that work, my refrigerator that keeps my food cold and fresh, toothpaste so my teeth feel clean. You get the idea. You could do a 30 minute meditation on gratitude for everything in your house from the smallest light switch to your AC system. And while you do it, send prayers for all those on our planet who do not have that item or comfort in their home. By the time you get to work after doing a meditation like this, you’ll know you have many things that fill your life with goodness and comfort.
You get to choose how you want to see things. You can focus on what you lack or you can focus on what you have. You will almost certainly feel better focusing on what you have than what you lack.
You can be pissed off that you didn’t get the report you needed or you can’t find the tool you need, or you can choose to focus on what you were able to finish and how grateful you are for the people who help you with your work.
Supporting What You Have with more Energy
The second reason gratitude works is that when we focus our attention on something, we feed it energy. Or to put another way, what you give away you receive back (some would say you get back 3 fold what you give away).
So you can either feed the thought – ‘I don’t have enough; I don’t have what I need” or feed the thought ‘I am bountifully supported; All that I need is available to me’. As I was appreciating a beautiful day last week, a guy who I had been meaning to call across town happened to stop by my office and give me exactly what I was looking for. How cool is that?
Receiving Joyfully
The last part of gratitude is that when we practice living and working in gratitude, we learn to receive with joy. How open are you to receiving? Can you receive joyfully? Can you accept goodness in your life? Or do you push away offers for help, people offering to pay for your lunch etc.? Pay attention to how you are blocking the flow of energy and support vs. receiving gifts and support from others – in large or small ways.
As you practice receiving in joy, you recognize the abudant flow in your life. From that place of abundance, you draw in more abundance – of helpful people, of small acts of kindness, of physical things appearing in your life- rather than shutting them out.
When you focus on gratitude, you shift your energy – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually.
What have you seen happen in your life when you receive joyfully or express gratitude for what you have?
Linda is an author, speaker, coach, and consultant. Go to her website www.lindajferguson.com to read more about her work, view video clips of her talks, and find out more about her book “Path for Greatness: Spirituality at Work” available on Amazon.
“I’m blessed – thanks!” This is how the finance guy of a local car dealer shared with us in response to the question that we are all asked daily, “how are you?” His response not only made us feel good, we ended up having a very meaningful conversation during our 15 minutes together. Even though this was a couple of years ago already, I have never forgotten how inspiring his response was. I’m still trying to change my habitual “I’m good” response to one of gratitude like above. Not only do we feel better when we choose a grateful response, we have the ability to elevate those around us.
There is so much I want to share about gratitude, as this is one of my favorite teaching and topics to live. All of the master teachers that I’m learning from stress the importance of gratitude. In fact I was just listening to an interview of Anthony Robbins who said that the secret to living is giving. I heard how Wayne Dwyer gives thanks whenever he sees a penny, dime or any change on the ground by picking it up and saying a prayer of gratitude for how financially blessed he is. During an interview with the authors of Project Everlasting as my husband and I recently won a national love-story competition (mentioned in C is for Connection blog) they said how the marriage masters interviewed for their book and documentary explained that love is a four letter word: GIVE!
What I need are gratitude reminders, those little things to help keep me on track to remember to stop and appreciate all the blessings in my life. If you could only choose one thing to work on in your life that you bring you the most happiness and abundance I believe it’s about learning how to be grateful. Embracing a new mindset – an “attitude of gratitude” has transformed my life. While I’ve always been an optimist by nature I realize how many of my thoughts were not. Yet practicing this skill over the years through keeping gratitude journals, researching it, teaching it all have helped me tremendously think grateful thoughts and thus act accordingly.
The first thing that I suggest to those at work who are struggling with someone in particular or with the workplace in general is to keep a gratitude journal. Every day for 30 days write at least one thing that you are grateful for with that person or that place. Then focus on that grateful thought for the day. You’ll be amazed how just shifting your thoughts for a month will provide you a new perspective. You might even be as grateful as my friend who did this experiment for 30 days. It was around day 23 when she called to tell me how good this attitude of gratitude was going with her boss. In fact she didn’t have to journal any more as he decided to leave the company! 
Insert the word thank you into your thoughts and actions. This alone has helped me remember all the ordinary things that we take for granted to be thankful for. Meister Eckhart’s wise words tell us, “If the only prayer you say in your life is “thank you,” it would be enough. Linda and I would like to THANK YOU for taking the time to read our blog and provide comments.
How will you give and live gratitude today?
Janae Bower is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant. She founded Finding IT, a company that specializes in personal and professional development getting to the heart of what matters most.
Fun at work can take many forms depending on the organization and the individual. Take my husband and me for example. This week we both had fun at work.
His fun came through a quality and teambuilding conference he attended. One evening after dinner together they all went go-cart racing. He had a blast trying to defend his winning title from last year. While his fun at work was more outwardly visible – people having a good time by laughing, joking and playing together – my fun was more of what I would describe inward fun. Both ways are about feeling good!
Usually when it’s nap or quiet time with my boys, I rush to the computer to get work done. This morning I decided to have fun at work. My son Garrett fell asleep in the car and instead of getting out of the car myself when I arrived home, I stayed in the car. I rolled open my sun roof to enjoy the warmth of the sun on this beautiful Minnesota summer day. I reclined my chair, shut my eyes and listened to the wisdom of one of my favorite spiritual teachers, Dr. Wayne Dwyer. I had so much fun just “being” and soaking in all the light and enlightenment into my soul. When Garrett woke up we proceeded to cool off in the backyard swinging together in the hammock. On the hammock I felt great as I reflected on all the things I was grateful for my life, smiled at my son and wrote this entry in my mind. This is the kind of work is fun to me!
An organization that is world famous for having fun at work is Pike Place Fish Market in Seattle. How they became world famous was the intention to be and had fun living up to it along the way. On the road of becoming world famous, the fishmongers crated a philosophy to guide them. An important part of their philosophy is to “Play” and have a good time at work. A training video company filmed this amazing, high-energy and spirited workplace and called the video Fish. Since then their company culture has become a model for other organizations. Pike Place Fish is now used as a case study in business schools and universities. There are at least four books that have been published about Pike Place Fish, one an international best-seller. They are the subject of the best selling training videos and DVDs in the world.
Leslie Yerkes, author of a couple of books about having fun at work, states that fun isn’t the prize at work, but is the work. “When fun is integrated with work instead of segmented from work, the resultant fusion creates energy; it cements relationships between coworkers and between workers and the company. When fun is integrated into work, it fosters creativity and results in improved performance.”
How will you infuse fun into your work?
Janae Bower is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant. She founded Finding IT, a company that specializes in personal and professional development getting to the heart of what matters most.
There is a growing recognition even among the hardest-driving companies that they pay a price for not engaging their employees. A disengaged workplace can manifest itself in low morale, high turnover, burnout, frequent stress-related illness, and rising absenteeism. Many years ago the Gallup Organization discovered that, “disengaged” or “actively disengaged” employees which make up 64% of the workforce, could cost organizations overall up to $355 billion a year! The smartest organizations – and employees – are revitalizing their workplaces to become supportive and inspirational environments. When employees are encouraged to release their passions and potential, they become fully engaged in the work and committed to the organization. As a result, the possibility for organizations to produce greater productivity and profits is significantly increased. By being engaged you can create a vibrant place to work not only for yourself, but for all those around you.
The first way is be aware of your energy level. Think of the workplace as each of us walking around as balls of energy emitting waves of vibrations to each other. While you can’t physically see these vibrations you can feel and hear how they impact other people’s energy levels. For example, the workplace is filled with “energy vampires” just waiting to suck the energy from you and everyone else around them. The workplace is also filled with “energy fairies” wanting to sprinkle their magical, positive “gold energy dust” on all those they come into contact with. While workplace vampires drain us of our energy and thus disengage us with our work, the workplace fairies uplift our energy making us feel lighter and more connected with our work.
The other way is through enthusiasm. I’ve always appreciated that the Greek root of this word means God within. To be enthusiastic is something that we need to be from the inside out. We resonate our enthusiasm to others once we know how to radiate it first within ourselves; connecting with the heart of we are, our divine selves.
To fully engage in our workplaces is a choice we make each day. Poet David Whyte shared an analogy that has always stuck with me. He said how we need to bring our wholeselves to work because many of leave most of who we are in the car when we go to work. Yet when we are engaged, fully engaged in ourselves, we tap into our highest energy and enthusiasm levels; allowing us to work wholeheartedly!
Janae Bower is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant. She founded Finding IT, a company that specializes in personal and professional development getting to the heart of what matters most.
Janae Bower of FindingIt is an inspirational speaker, award-winning author and training consultant who helps others get to the heart of what matters most.
Linda Ferguson wrote the book "Path for Greatness: Spirituality at Work" and has presented workshops around the country on aligning our gifts, passion and purpose.Provided by
