Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Productivity – Do You Feel Productive In Your Business?

As entrepreneurs, it is important to feel like we have accomplished something on the days when we are working. But I hear from many entrepreneurs there are good days and there are very unproductive days.
So, what is happening on those unproductive days? Distractions are the biggest complaint. Facebook, emails, text messages, phone calls, other people’s requests and our very own thoughts taking us on wild rides.
What I am going to suggest first will rise above all these distractions. Do you know where you are going this year? Do you have a plan? Do you have a destination? Are you committed to it? Does it motivate you to get out of bed each day and excite you and scare you at the same time?
If the answer is “no” to any of these questions, then that is the best place to start. What are your top goals for the year and why are they important to you? If your “why” does not make you cry, in other words, create emotion in you, then it is probably not your real “why”. Once you have the real motivation inside of you, then no matter how unproductive the day, you will just get right back into the swing of things the next day. It gives you the strength to carry on.
The next aspect to look at is systems. What systems do you have in place? Because we are creatures of habit, we end up living our lives based on old habits or programming approximately 95% of the time. The old habits (old programs) are running the show, so our lives are created mostly from our subconscious programming of our old habits. It is like an internal map or blueprint that has to match the outside world. If we are not cultivating new productive habits, the old ones run automatically (even without our knowing it). This is when we feel in a rut.
What new productive habits have you made into “a system” or a daily ritual? We need a structure so habitual it happens automatically. This takes time to set this up and put it into place. We used to think it took 21 days for a new habit to be developed but new research is showing that it takes an average of 66 days to create a new habit.
I highly recommend the system I set up in The 30 Laws of Flow called Going For The Flow.  There you will find various levels of support to set up daily rituals to enhance your productivity. You will receive daily the following: a Universal or Cosmic Law to contemplate, a meditation to read, time for gratitude, exercise options, a hydration plan, a life insight, a mindful practice, and a success strategy. You can choose which ones you need to implement for your routine to help you with your productivity.
Unfortunately on your own, since we are emotional beings and highly distractible, it is not going to work. You need an accountability partner or a coach. Remember you are a creature of habit and you end up living your life based on old habits or programming approximately 95% of the time. So you need that outside motivation to keep you on track. Just take a look at your past performance on your own and that will give you a clue.
I invite you to step outside your comfort zone (the place where all the old habits reside), and start creating the productive days where at the end of your day, you are satisfied with all you’ve accomplished and feel your time was well spent. You are fulfilling your life’s purpose.
To your success.
Charlene

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Change Your Relationship to Food – How to Get Food Freedom

Health is a birthright and a responsibility. But when we look around we see many people who are not healthy. There are many factors contributing to this but the one thing we do have control over is what we eat.
What we eat can totally affect our health. When people eat a diet based on highly refined foods, they tend to consume too many calories and too little nutrition, which leads to excess body weight and nutrient gaps. Our diets today tend to be too high in calories and too low in good nutritional value. Many people fall short on essential nutrients in their diets. Studies show that people with healthy dietary patterns including whole grains, fruit, and vegetables – rich in vitamins, minerals, and fibre – have a lower risk of developing chronic conditions.
Because we are complex beings, we have many associations with food. Food may have been used as a reward or punishment as we grew up. We develop emotional connections to food. We can eat to reward ourselves, to soothe ourselves, because we are bored, to please another person or simply for the pleasure of eating, To get food freedom in this area would require looking at these emotional connections and work on developing different associations. It would require paying attention and eavesdropping on our subconscious self-talk dialogue.
What many people are unaware of is the impact the food industry has on our health and our food choices. When food production became a business it became a profit based food industry. Profits are the goal of that industry, not our health.  They work on advertising to present food or even “pretend” food in the best light. Sugar is in many foods, even unexpected ones like organic, hormone-free, antibiotic free, and nitrate free bacon. When we see natural flavorings, it means they have added just a little of the natural ingredients to artificial flavorings so they can label it in a way we would think it is good. They find “feel good” images and then associate that good feeling with what brand of food they are advertising.  Most people are unaware of this hypnosis by the food industry when they are shopping. These less-than-healthy food choices are often lacking in vitamins, minerals, and other important nutrients.
To get food freedom in this area would require looking at food labels. Ingredients are sorted by volume, so be aware of the main ingredients. Many times a form of sugar is near the top of the list. People consume 70 kilograms of sugar a year on average. Since it is addictive, the food manufacturers add it to just about everything.  Read the labels and look at the ingredients of everything you eat.
We must make it a goal of deprogramming ourselves from the food manufacturers “programming” and getting a handle on emotional eating.  This will entail getting conscious about food decisions and eating consciously and mindfully. It will involve aiming for healthier foods, eliminating non-foods, staying hydrated and making a lifestyle transformation focusing on “clean eating”.  Not only will this be significant for our health but for the health of our future generations so that their ‘wants’ will already be right and they will be free from the start.
I encourage you to join the food revolution and get your food freedom. If you require any assistance go to http://charleneday.com/contact/.
To your good health,
Charlene

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

How To Reverse The Aging Process – Part 2 The Mental/Emotional Aspects

In the last blog, we looked at things we could do to slow down or even reverse the aging process on the physical level. We will now look at the mental/emotional aspects of staying younger longer.

One of the biggest contributors to aging is stress. It can make us older faster and is said to be the root cause for most diseases. Reducing your stress level will certainly reverse your ageing. Stress can be countered by being calm and balanced. To accomplish this, make a concerted effort to watch when you start getting stressed. Then look at the situation and accept it as it is, rather than what you want it to be. When we do this we are said to be in a state of equanimity or a state of “even mind”. We have a mental calmness even when we are in difficult situations. This takes daily practice to achieve this state.  Here are some ideas.As I said before, in order to feel healthy and energetic longer, it is going to require being conscious of the choices we are making.
Stress Relievers/Age Reversers:
  • Meditation or just sitting quietly to unclutter the mind is a good remedy to reduce stress.
  • Slowing down and smelling the roses also plays an essential role in countering stress and even reversing your age.
  • Practising mindfulness, being aware of the present moment is so freeing.
  • Simply “going with the flow” offsets stress.
  • Being the “observer” and not getting caught up in the fray of what is happening around you, will work miracles.
  • Being mindful to respond instead of reacting to situations will cut the stress.
  • Being open to new ideas, social opportunities, experiences, foods, new anything keeps you young.
  • Recognizing that all of life is impermanent is a great key to freedom from stress.
  • Having an attitude of gratitude, getting in touch with the feeling of gratefulness daily will change your life.
  • Watching your language, both the inner (what you say to yourself) and the outer (what you say to others) can have a profound effect on the ageing process.
  • Giving to others, compliments, unexpected good deeds, random acts of kindness brings much happiness and tranquillity.
  • Each morning decide what kind of day you are going to have and set the intention to have an awesome day. This will add years to your life.
Another big contributor to ageing is out of control emotions.  Anger and worry can age you quickly. Anger is the result of hanging on to something that happened in the past. Worry shows up when you are thinking too far ahead into the future. You may need some outside help to deal with these emotions from a more objective point of view so that they don’t slow down your ageing process. But you can reduce or eliminate angry and worrisome thoughts by increasing your awareness and being attentive when they come into your mind.
There are many areas to look at in terms of slowing down the ageing process. For more information or to ask any questions, go to http://charleneday.com/contact.
To your good health!
Charlene

Tuesday, March 7, 2017

How To Reverse The Aging Process – Part 1 The Physical Body


Once we are on this planet, we are beginning to age.  When we are young, it doesn’t faze us. Sometimes we want to grow older faster, so we can get to the next best thing. However, as we get later on in years, we sometimes wish that we could slow down or even reverse this process.
The bottom line is that we all hope to be as healthy as possible until we die. We can look around and see so many elders who are here in body but not in mind or are suffering from a myriad of diseases. Growing older does not mean that we have to get sick. We want a better quality of life as we age.
In order to feel healthy and energetic longer, it is going to require being conscious of the choices we are making. We live in a society that does not cater to good health!   So we need to exercise caution not to follow the status quo. This may require a coach, a support group or strong willpower to make choices that possibly your friends are not making.
Let’s take a look at what we can do for the physical body.
Let’s  look at your eating lifestyle. Is it based on fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, less meat if you are a meat eater, no dairy from the cow or soy milk, low or no sugar and no trans fats?  Everywhere we look we see lots of sugar and lots of trans fat type of foods.  When people actually change their lifestyle to healthy eating, they are choosing organic foods, eating smaller portions, and choosing more alkaline foods. They are going chemical free with a minimum of processed foods. So take a look in this area of your life and see if you need to make any changes in order to live longer, healthier.
Good quality food supplements are vital these days. When food became a business one hundred years ago, the quality of our food diminished greatly. So we are in a position where supplementation is essential these days. You can read more about this in my blog at http://charleneday.com/which-vitamins-to-buy/.
Getting the right amount of sleep for your body is important. The best way to find out what your body needs is to not set an alarm and then see when you wake up naturally. Do that for a few days and take the average and that will be what your body needs for regeneration.
Deep breathing is crucial for slowing down the aging process. Take a few minutes each day and concentrate on breathing to a count of four. Breathing in for 4, holding for 4 and exhaling for 4. Exercise is essential as well to slow down the aging process. Find what you love and do it often.
Another aspect of healthy living is looking to avoid the toxins around us as much as we can. The only place we have complete control is in our own home. Our homes can be filled with countless harmful toxic chemicals. Most likely they will be found in our cleaning products but they can also be found in our grooming aids.  Investigate the natural ways to cleaning and grooming yourself. I chose Shaklee products to clean up the toxins in my house. They are recommended by Dr. Doris Rapp, a noted pediatrician, and allergy specialist, as well as many other professionals.
There are many areas to look at in terms of slowing down the aging process. In the next blog, we will look at the mental/emotional aspects of staying younger longer. For more information or to ask any questions, go to http://charleneday.com/contact/.
To your good health!
Charlene

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Do you Consider Yourself an Entrepreneur?


The online dictionaries describe an entrepreneur as “a person who starts a business and is willing to risk loss in order to make money” or “one who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise.”
If you want to be a successful entrepreneur start out with a customer problem and find or develop a product that solves it. Entrepreneurs are those who identify a need and fill it.
Here are some qualities of entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs step into their power through the choices they are drawn to make. They are values driven and have learned to think differently. Entrepreneurs act as spark plugs, activating and stimulating economic activity. Some qualities of entrepreneurs stand out, especially that they:
  • risk-takers and rule breakers
  • have an unquenchable desire, lifelong learners
  • passionate, energetic and creative
  • are obsessed with goal setting and setting outcomes
  • able to encompass both excitement and fear simultaneously
  • can handle uncertainty
  • are decisive, highly self-motivated and self possessed
  • bounce back from adversity, resilient and flexible
  • identify and service unmet needs
  • create value through solutions
  • initiate change, are innovators
  • take advantage of change
  • value self-reliance and self-awareness
  • strive for excellence
  • know the value of mentorship/masterminds
  • are highly optimistic, have a winning attitude
  • deeply interested and care for others, have great people skills
  • genuinely interested in developing sincere, long lasting relationships
  • desire to inspire others
  • do what is right and meaningful, are ethical, have high integrity
  • are big picture thinkers and future driven
  • see problems as opportunities
  • creatively identify the solutions to problems
  • want to make a difference
With persistence and determination, they create businesses or opportunities that make a difference for themselves and others. Look at the most dynamic societies in the world and you’ll find the ones that have the most entrepreneurs.
There is a unique expression within you that is meant to contribute to the world. When we act on our uniqueness and on what we have learned, we become natural entrepreneurs, and are expressing our gifts to this planet. We are leaving our legacy. Are you ready to step up and bring your gifts to light?
Ready to move forward? Schedule your Discovery session at http://charleneday.com/.
To your success.
Charlene