Using Negativity in a Good Way: The Lab Rats Explore How Much Their Lives Suck

The Lab Rats kicked things off by diving right into the major suckiness of their lives. By starting at the lowest point, they then have a list of things against which they can compare their actions and see progress.

Overall, the Lab Rats don’t feel passion in their current work situations and don’t see a path out of the suckiness. The resulting negativity discourages them to take care of themselves and leaves them feeling cut off even from the people who normally support them. The negative feelings extend all the way into the home life where they all feel dissatisfied with their living situations in some way or another.

In other words, there’s a general sense of failure and no idea how to break free from patterns and habits that keep them on the same path they are on now.

Lab Rat Suckiness

In each case, a lot of the trouble comes from a sense of invested time (and money). Horatio for example has already spent a good chunk of his life pursuing a career with little chance for advancement. He’s taken on work that he doesn’t like because it at least uses some of the skills he spent so much time learning.

Wendee would go back to school to fulfill her dreams of teaching but the jobs aren’t guaranteed and she worries about risking going further into debt.

Alessio’s suckiness comes down to a feeling that he’s not where he wants to be at in any part of his work or home life. He too hates his job and hates that he lives at home. This makes him irritable which then colors everything with a negative paintbrush.

Since Lizzie is a stay-at-home mom at the moment, her suckiness focuses around her homelife. It’s not as satisfying as she would like it to be, but it unsure of how to change it. Plus she feels that she’s losing her career opportunities bit by bit and so like everyone else in the group feels insecure about her abilities.

Lab Rat Awesomeness

Life isn’t all bad, however. Lizzie’s partner and in-laws offer her all the love and acceptance she could ask for – and more! – plus even though she’s living away from her beloved downtown life, she has to-die-for views from her country home and is beginning to develop a strong circle of friends.

Alessio’s girlfriend and friends support and love him, and he’s taking and doing well in courses that improve his confidence and will give them the skills he needs to move beyond his current suckiness.

Wendee also has an amazing man in her life plus a a lot of support from friends and colleauges. Even her ex-husband is pleasant! She’s socially active and very self-aware, plus prefers to look on the positive side of life and look for solutions instead of for problems.

And Horatio also has a stable relationship, decent finances and has traveled a good deal throughout his life. Plus although he social circle is small he has a few good friends with whom he does things regularly.

Measuring Progress

So, what does all this mean for the Lab Rats and their progress through the maze?

Well, let’s take a look back at their goals:

Alessio: Looking for tools to break his waiting habit.
Having pinpointed what bothers him the most – work and living situations – we can focus on finding him the tools to change the two of them.

Horatio: Hoping to find a way to put passion back into his life.
For Horatio, everything focuses around his stalled career. Knowing this he can put all his energies into making it better and let the trickle-down effect improve the rest of his life.

Lizzie: Wanting to focus her energy instead of splashing it about.
Since Lizzie’s suckiness centres on not accomplishing anything, by turning her attention to small victories in a variety of tasks, she can rebuild her confidence and narrow her interests so that she’s effectively moving forward on a number of fronts.

Wendee: Yearning for a career that satisfies and provides the income she desires.
In her list of complaints, aside from money worries, Wendee pointed out that most of her negativity deals with a sense of not having the impact on the world that she wanted and the envy that comes from seeing others succeed. By using the positivity that she shows in other areas of her life, Wendee will be able to identify ways to make the changes that will bring her the success she craves.

All four also noted that by going through these first few exercises they’ve become more aware of their lives and more aware of the day-to-day actions and choices they make. And by being more self-aware, they can make more informed choices and take more focused actions and figure out exactly what they want to do with the their lives instead of just moaning about what’s not working for them.

Next week we’ll look at the way society likes to focus on the negative and what it does to make the Lab Rats stay where they are instead of moving forward.

Starting Life Someday-Free: Bud Hennekes Interview

I love doing interviews with young people. Bud is just finishing high school and yet he has a better grasp on the whole Someday-Busting thing than many people twice his age. Of course, I felt the same way back at age 17, but I let fear block me from actually following through on any of my dreams. Reading Bud’s interview I doubt that Bud will allow himself to get blocked in the same way.

Who: Bud Hennekes of A Boundless World
Bud is a person who’s passionate about living life to the fullest, awakening people to their true potential along the way.

Name one moment in your life when you threw a pity party for yourself and the reasons why you felt you weren’t able to achieve your goals. Were you feeling stuck? Had you felt you failed? What wasn’t working in your life?
I stopped throwing myself pity parties long ago. When I was a freshman and sophomore in high school I ran cross country for my high school team. I was the king of pity parties.

Whenever I had a bad race I would always throw myself a pity party hoping that those around would feel sorry for me. I threw pity parties but no one came.

It took a while, but I eventually realized that pity parties did more harm than good. You see when you throw pity parties for yourself, you reinforce the negative thoughts that made you feel down in the first place. Never wallow in your own mistakes, rather accept them and move on.

Too often we put way to much pressure on ourselves consequently remain miserable. There’s no rule in life saying we can’t fail. There’s no rule in life saying we can’t come up short.

When you make a mistake accept that you made a mistake. When you feel bad accept that you feel bad. Don’t continually wallow in your own shortcomings, instead embrace each and every moment you have.

Even our lowest moments fulfill a need in us or express our desires. When you threw yourself that pity party, what did you hope to gain? What need did you fulfill?
When we throw pity parties for ourselves we are often under the illusion that this will make everything better. But in reality all pity parties do is prolong the recovery time it takes to return to our optimal state.

Pity parties accomplish nothing. It’s OK to feel bad. It’s OK to feel down.

It’s not OK to continually wallow in our own shortcomings for then we allow the negative emotions to dictate our life.

Feel your emotions and let them go.

When I regularly threw pity parties for myself I hoped that someone would come along and make me feel better. The truth is the only one who can truly make you feel better is yourself. Yes friends and family can lend you support ( I don’t know where I’d be without it.) but you are in control.

You don’t need to throw a pity party to feel better. All you need is redirect your thoughts. 🙂

Tell us what you did to break up the pity party. What actions did you decide to take? Did someone help you buoy your spirits? Push you along?
Whenever I am feeling down I try to accept my feeling rather than resist them. The more you resist your emotions the stronger they become.

We will all have moments in our life when we aren’t at our best but we must learn to be able to redirect our negative thoughts into a more positive manner.

The worst thing we can do is allow your negative emotions to become a part of you. When your feeling down it is essential that you seek encouragement from your friends and family. They want to help you.

I also spend a great amount of time searching for some motivational material. When your motivated you’d be surprised at how quickly your party ends.

Can you look back on that moment and tell us how you felt when you did decide to take action? What results came about from your decision to take charge and move on?
Whenever I fee like I’m about to throw a pity party for myself I close my eyes and take several deep breathes. I ask “why am I feeling like this?” This allows me to regain some control of my emotions.

Often times we act on impulse which prolongs the time we are feeling down.

When your feeling sad or depressed slow down. Take a moment to just be. Close your eyes and take several deep breathes. Simply doing so will have a tremendous effect on your mood.

One of my favorite things to do when I’m having a bad day, is to take out a piece of paper and write down all the things I”m grateful for. I learned this method from money of the most successful individuals today.

I remember specifically one day I took out the piece of paper and I couldn’t think of ANYTHING I was grateful for, so I wrote down “I’m thankful for being able to breathe.”

This really hit me as just the gift of breathing is something to be thankful for.

Sure life is often far from perfect but when you really think about it, it’s great to be alive.

Everyone has a Someday problem hiding deep inside, even little ones. What variety of the Someday Syndrome do you currently harbor? What would you like to achieve but haven’t yet?
One of my major flaws is that I continually put off happiness. “When this is done I’ll be happy” I often say yet in reality I’m simply succumbing to the happiness illusion.

The key to being happy is to be experience the moment now. I have improved in this area tremendously over the years but I still have a ways to go. As I continue to put effort into living in the moment I have found myself to be much more happier. Happiness isn’t experienced tomorrow but rather right now.

Examining your Someday Syndrome problem, what are you currently doing to resolve it and eliminate it from your life?
Right now I’m making it my highest priority to do the things I love. All too often people fill their lives with people and things they can’t stand, then they wonder why they are miserable.

It is my belief that life is meant to be enjoyed. When I fill my days with things I love, living becomes effortless. When I choose to fill my day with things I dread life becomes a chore.

Obviously there will be things you don’t necessarily enjoy, yet it is important to make a conscious effort to keep those things to a minimum.

Many people suffer the same problems you do. You’re not alone, and neither are they. What would you tell people in your situation right now to help them avoid what you’re going through?
One of the greatest problems of today’s world is we all think we are alone. The reality is that we are all connected. I am aware that may come off as a bit new age but that is a belief I have been happy to adopt.

Too often we think that our problems are unique when in fact people have been through the exact situation you have.

When we realize that our problems are not unique it becomes easier to deal with them. If you are in a place in your life where you don’t want to be, there are people out there who want to help you. Realize that you are not alone.

Be grateful. Be happy. Time heals all pain.

If you could ask for one thing, right now, to help you overcome your Someday Syndrome, what type of help would you ask for?
I would just like to know that all the effort I’m putting in to making this world a better place will pay off. Too be honest I know without a doubt that it will, but there’s always that part in the back of your mind saying ” What if?”

While there is a chance it won’t I don’t have the time or energy to waste on playing the what if game. As long as I continue to put forth my best effort in helping humanity for the better my vision will manifest. Sure I may not know the exact path but I will reach my goals.

How Not to Follow Your Dreams

In this month’s guest post from Joely Black of In These Heels? she explores the best ways to never accomplish anything.

A few years ago, I had a friend who was a hairdresser. We used to get together for chats, and I used to talk about what I wanted to do with my life, my dreams and ambitions. One day, she brought me one of those office posters that I’ve seen up in various places where I’ve worked.

It was entitled “How Not To Follow Your Dreams.”

It recommended that it was very important not to have any idea what you wanted in life, and if you did, to avoid it as much as possible. It was crucial never to mention to anybody what you were doing. It was best to stick to the safe road, in a job where you could never get any fulfilment and to avoid all chance of promotion.

But it missed out on one really crucial thing. The most important means to avoid your dreams.

Believe that there’s no way you could ever do it.

Think small. That’s how you make sure there’s no chance you’ll ever get anywhere near those damned dreams. Remind yourself every day that although you could go out there and change your life, well, it might take a bit of effort and there’s a risk there.

You want to make sure you keep reminding yourself of all the people you’ve never heard of that you’re sure have failed at things. Keep telling yourself that everything you’ve done that showed an ounce of courage or power was just a fluke.

Buy a really, really big TV, and spend all your evenings watching it. It’s important to avoid anything inspirational, informative or remotely educational when doing this. Make sure you watch a lot of the news. The news is great for reminding you what an awful place the world is and nothing is really worth doing.

It helps if you can keep reminding yourself of all the terrible things that might happen if you even consider the possibility of living your dreams. What if you screw it up? What if your friends start hating you for doing something different with your life? What if it gets in the way of all that vital TV watching time?

I was reminded of the reason why it’s important to think differently about yourself if you want to do anything big with your life this week. I’d been practising the fine art of thinking small.

In a very, very tough situation, with my back against the wall, I couldn’t see a way out. I went to friends for advice and support. One of my friends wrote back to me and told me off. She reminded me that I don’t need advice from other people.

What I need, more than anything else, is help to start thinking better thoughts. This is how we avoid our dreams most effectively. We start thinking about ‘just getting by’, about what we might be able to find out there rather than what we’ve got to offer.

It steals away our creative responses to life. It’s all very well to talk about just taking action, but before you can do anything you need a powerful drive behind it to make that action work. The key lies in how you think about yourself, and the stories you tell about who you are and how the world works.

So this is my advice. If you’re going to avoid your dreams with any effectiveness, you need to keep telling yourself over and over again it’ll never work out. Listen to all the negative people and stories you can find about failure and loss, keep thinking that you’ll never make it, that you don’t have the answer, and that you can’t do it.

That way, you’ll probably never even make it out of bed in the morning, let alone get anywhere near a dream.

The World Owes Me Nothing: Glen Allsopp Interview

Someday Syndrome isn’t always about the big stuff. In many Someday Interviews, people have turned their lives around because of some big disruption in their life. Small events, however, can have the same effect. Let’s see what small event led Glen Allsopp to change his life and start pursuing a positive outlook on his life.

Who: Glen Allsopp from PluginID
Glen is a formely quiet guy who thought the world owed him a favour and who has since massively transformed all areas of his life. He now wants to help other people realise they can do the same.

Name one moment in your life when you threw a pity party for yourself and the reasons why you felt you weren’t able to achieve your goals. Were you feeling stuck? Had you felt you failed? What wasn’t working in your life.
I’m not really a fan of the phrase ‘pity party’ but I’m sure I’ve threw one for myself a few times ;). It’s quite sad really but there was once a girl that I really liked and when I eventually ‘got her’ I actually realised I wanted nothing to do with her and I let her know. Then, one day, I saw her with another guy and for some reason I was instantly crushed. I felt like I had really failed on this aspect of my life and couldn’t believe she had moved on.

I don’t feel like this at all with women now, but I think a lot of guys and girls can relate to that situation.

Even our lowest moments fulfill a need in us or express our desires. When you threw yourself that pity party, what did you hope to gain? What need did you fulfill?
When that situation happened (in a nightclub) I left straight away and just drove my car with no destination in mind for a few hours at a ridiculous time of the morning, cursing the world. I guess I wanted to get all the anger out so that I could move on from the situation.

Note: I really don’t recommend that people do this; driving a vehicle while in an emotionally charged state is never a good idea.

Tell us what you did to break up the pity party. What actions did you decide to take? Did someone help you buoy your spirits? Push you along?
I never actually spoke to anyone about it and I surprisingly got over it quite easily after that day. I just went out, met new people, talked to a lot of girls and had some fun.

Can you look back on that moment and tell us how you felt when you did decide to take action? What results came about from your decision to take charge and move on?
I guess I realised that the negativity serves no purpose. Here was a girl I honestly did not care about anymore, with another random stranger, and that was bothering me. It actually didn’t make any rational sense and as soon as I came to that realisation something ‘clicked’ inside and it no longer bothered me.

I think it’s good a good idea to to put our ‘problems’ under the rationality test. Ask yourself is there any rational reason for your beliefs or the way that you feel. You’ll often find the answer is no and that in itself is enough to help you move on from the situation.

I constantly remind myself a simple fact, and while some may view it as negative, I think it is very important: I will die one day. As soon as you remember to realise this, all the little problems you think you have in your life suddenly become a lot less important.

Everyone has a Someday problem hiding deep inside, even little ones. What variety of the Someday Syndrome do you currently harbor? What would you like to achieve but haven’t yet?
I actually think I’m quite good at taking action and getting things done these days, but I also think I harbour some Someday Syndrome traits. My full-time job is working from home and making a living online, and as anyone who spends a lot of time on the internet will tell you, there are a lot of distractions.

I’ll go over to a forum to answer some questions about a product I have launched or something similar and then find myself 20 minutes later reading something completely unrelated to what I wanted to do in the first place. I would like to be able to stay completely focused on the task at hand, even with a working environment as distracting as the internet.

Examining your Someday Syndrome problem, what are you currently doing to resolve it and eliminate it from your life?
You have actually asked that at a good time. I’m currently on day 2 of a 7 day challenge which involves cutting out all things and websites that distract me such as Facebook, Meebo (online MSN and Google Talk) and other sites that don’t really serve much of a purpose. I’m quite embarassed at the fact that I’m actually finding it very difficult but there is no other option for me than to complete it.

I also run around 10 websites and do far too more stats checking than is necessary so I’m cutting that down to once a day at the most.

Many people suffer the same problems you do. You’re not alone, and neither are they. What would you tell people in your situation right now to help them avoid what you’re going through?
Perform an honest self-assessment of your current situation and decide what you want. I’m honest in that I know I waste time on certain websites or chatting to my friends, and right now it doesn’t help me in anyway so I need to cut it out.

Even if you perform an honest self-assessment though, it’s not always enough to change your habits. I am only in the UK so that I can work hard on my projects and begin to travel the world with the money that I’ve saved. To me this is far more important than checking my email ten times per day or accepting Facebook friend requests.

Decide what is really important to you because if you don’t it will be easy to slip back into less-productive habits.

If you could ask for one thing, right now, to help you overcome your Someday Syndrome, what type of help would you ask for? You might be tempted to provide a cheeky answer, but stop and think a moment about what would really help you.
To be honest I think this is something each individual has to deal with on their own. Someone can give you advice and push you to change, but their efforts will only go so far. You have to want to change and you have to take action to get your desired results.

P.S. Glen also features me today over at PluginID in his latest Personal Development Face-Off.
As well, I’m substituting for Joanna Young today over at Confident Writing while she’s leading a writing retreat in Italy.

The 25 Rants of Alex Fayle: a twisted meme

After seeing the 25 things you don’t know about me meme floating around the blogosphere, I decided to come up with my own version—twenty-five rants! Let’s see if I can actually get all the way to twenty-five or whether I run out before I get there…

1. I hate having to work for things—what’s wrong with instant success?
2. Why do the same words have to mean such different things for each person? The people who built the Tower of Babel have a lot to answer for.
3. It really irritates me that it’s so much easier to gain weight than lose it.
4. Why do I have to be one of those middle-aged men with ear-hair? By the time I’m 80, I’ll be deaf from all the hair filling up my ear canal.
5. I used to be able to do 30 chin-ups no problem. Why does 3 years of doing nothing with my arms mean I can barely pull myself up once?
6. Teleporters should exist.
7. I write for an eco-blog and yet I’m not very green at times—and I get filled with eco-guilt. Why do I have to have a conscience?
8. I hate have to play catchup after waiting around to figure out what system would work best for something new in my life (ie, teaching English classes where I develop the syllabus). Two whole days gone to scanning and organizing!
9. To follow along with numbers 3, 5 and 7, why is it always easier to be lazy than to eat right/exercise well/live healthy?
10. Truth be told, I hate working. I’d much rather spend my days puttering. Why doesn’t someone recognize my genius and pay me to putter and write awesome stuff?
11. Coming from a home under constant renovation, I always felt that I should be more interested in home improvements than I am. But there are far too many details. Let me design and someone else can be practical. (BTW, the designing usually happens at 3am when I can’t sleep. I redesign other people’s homes too.)
12. Seriously, why is there no big research money going into teleporter development?
13. Why do I have to be such a frickin’ optimistic person? Here I am only halfway through and I’m having trouble coming up with more things to rant about!
14. I love cooking and I don’t mind dishes, but dirty stoves and grease residue? No thank you! Someone else can deal with that crap.
15. I spend most of my day in English and then stumble through evenings and weekends in Spanish. Sometimes I feel like I’m in neither one place nor the other.
16. My mother sent me a 1kg jar of peanut butter for Xmas (it arrived just last week) and I’m already halfway through it. I’m such an extremist, all-or-nothing kind of guy. In everything! It’s exhausting at times (but usually actually kind of fun).
17. To get what I want there a whole bunch of things that I don’t really feel like doing. Why is there no short-cut to success?
18. All too often my clothing, food and home décor tastes lie way beyond my budget, and yet I don’t care enough to make the effort to change it.
19. Details either bore me to tears or absorb me so thoroughly I forget the world exists—usually the latter only when I’m avoiding something else
20. The worse thing about living in a non-English city? The lack of books to read. Sure I could buy them from Amazon but I already have run out of space. I just want a library with a good selection of new releases.
21. My computer is three years old. I want a new one but know it’s not a priority purchase—the impatient side of me, however, says that the lost productivity in waiting for Firefox and Google to decide to do anything would more than make up for the cost. So far that voice hasn’t won the debate yet. Can’t decide whether I’m pleased or irritated.
22. Why did ABC cancel my favourite show, Pushing Daisies? It was the highlight of my week and now that’s been stolen away from me. At least they rescued Scrubs for me.
23. Yesterday I swept the bedroom and herded up enough dust bunnies into a single ball to name it and keep it as a pet. Today the exact same thing. Where does all this hair come from in a house without pets?
24. Did I mention that teleports should exist?
25. This eventually got way to easy. Good thing I’m stopping now or I’ll put myself in a hugely bad mood.

Normally with these meme things, I’m supposed to tag people, but I’m now feeling to cranky to. Do whatever the *&^#$ you feel like with this. But if you do rant, tell me about it. It’s fun watching other bitch and complain.