I’ve spent much of my life trying to find a perfect balance between “I have to do X” and “I want to do Y.”  As a result, I’ve often denied myself an opportunity to live and really enjoy the present moment.

Every activity can be viewed as have to, want to, or get to. 

“Have to” energy drains the life out of us. Obligation and responsibility fills our being. We act to meet other’s expectations and not our own.  We do to do. We give a small piece of our selves away every time we choose to view an activity as “have to.” “Have to” activities hold us in the past.

“Want to” energy is filled with hope, optimism, and excitement. Goals and dreams live in this realm. A positive experience with fulfilling our “wants” builds our confidence, fearlessness, and drives our self-beliefs on what we see as possible. Conversely, our negative experience with not fulfilling our desires fills our world with frustration and regret. “Want to” ideology only works when we can turn them into “get to” action. Without this step, we live in a fantasy world.

We can dream about what we want, but what’s the point unless we are willing to take action?

“Get to” energy is action oriented langage designed for living in the now. Imagine experiencing every activity as it is and not as we want it to be or it has to be. Reframing how we see “have to” or “want to” activities makes all the difference. Fully present in the moment, we are more aware and can easily let go of any preconceived expectations. We can be free of our self limiting beliefs. We can be grateful for all that exists in this moment. Nothing else matters. Living with “get to” energy is a privilege worth pursuing.

Everyday changes are new opportunities where we get to…

The only thing certain in life, is change.  Finding ways to transition through changes is how we evolve. Forward momentum comes from changing our relationship to present moment. When we are present, we can change our perspective to what is possible. We can stop resisting life and start living it.

Today, I get to shift my being from “Have to” energy to “Get to” energy.  

Will you join me in making this shift?

Today, you get to…

REPEAT AFTER ME….There is no such thing as work life balance.

Work life balance is propaganda for the unconscious masses.

You will not find your dream life pursuing work life balance. Instead, you find yourself living in a nightmare.

Your dreams will die chasing this mythical unachievable high wire balancing act.

There is no separation between your personal and professional lives. 

We are the same person at work as we are at home. Try as we might, we cannot separate the two.

We are one whole human being. Our human components do not exist separately.

We have a conscious mind that loves to think and rationalize.

We have sub-conscious mind full of history, beliefs, attitudes, and emotional feelings.

We have spirit that seeks love, purpose, and meaning.

We have a body the provides the functional energy we need to live.

No matter where you go, you are there as one fully integrated human being.

We cannot deny this inevitable indisputable truth. We know no other way, but to be a whole human being.

We are who we are. Others are who they are. It’s time to stop separating these facts from reality.

Our futile attempts to seek a work life balance only serve to push us further away from our truth.

Chasing dreams requires finding our truth and finding a way to fully integrated all aspects of our being into everything we do.

Satisfaction comes from knowing we have fulfilled our needs and desires. Satisfaction is defined by living a life true to ourself, not a life others expect of us.

Aren’t you tired of trying to satisfy someone else’s needs and desires? 

Yet, every day the masses willingly choose to sacrifice their own personal satisfaction for professional satisfaction or vice-a-versa.

It’s time to put ourselves first. We are a fully integrated human being who desires both a personal and professionally satisfying life. It’s time to stop pretending we are not.

Our lives belong to us. We control the choices we make.

We choose to make choices that compromise or support our satisfaction. We answer to our decisions.

Give up this silly notion of Work Life Balance and start seeking personal and professional satisfaction in everything you do.

Start NOW. Say YES to the things that have meaning to you. Skip the rest.

Make choices that prioritize both your personal and professional satisfaction.

Your dream life demands it!

Ever try driving a car with no hands and the peddle to the metal? Fear sets in…we are going to DIE!!! We pray for an unending straight away with no obstacles. Only one thing can result from this kind of reckless behavior…an epic crash!!!

Putting our hands on the steering wheel dramatically increases the thrill and excitement as we negotiate the road at high-speed. Heart-pumping adrenaline rush…we are alive!!!

Living without a sense of what we want is akin to driving with no hands on the wheel. An epic crash awaits without taking proactive action towards creating the life we desire.

What do you want?

Wants are not material desires. They are not the next iPhone or a new Macbook Air. Wants are much more satisfying and deeper than that. They are an emotional desire, something we crave or would like to accomplish. Desires excite and motivate us into action.

Determining our emotional wants does not come naturally. If it did, we would already know what we want and this discussion could end right here.

Passionate action comes from being connected to who we are, what we care about, and what we want. Here’s a few ways I’ve found helpful in determining what we want.

When was the last time you had conversation for future possibility with yourself?

In this conversation, you are only going to focus on what you want. Irrelevant thoughts, challenges, and risks will creep in. Acknowledge and park them in a parking lot for another time. This conversation is too important to let your resistance and fears get in the way.

Please try to avoid jumping straight into action. Reactive action puts us in the driver seat of a high-speed car without a steering wheel. Before we put our foot on the gas, we better be sure we want to travel down road in front of us.

Without wants, it’s easy to fall into the trap of doing to do.

Feeding our wants fuels our passion and thirst for life. We take action by following what is in our own heart. This is not what the market, your friends, or your family wants you to do. This is what do you and only you want.  Only you know what that is. Follow you.

What do you care about?  

Living our dreams is about committing to a world we care about. Operating on our cares enables us to be a part of something bigger than our selves. Freeing us to confidently be who we are in the world. The more connected you become to your cares, the easier it is to get behind the wheel and race at higher speeds.

What have you thought about doing, again and again, but have never started doing?

Thought, ideas, and feelings we repeatedly have are clues to what we desire most. What patterns of reoccurrence of these desires do you notice? Capture these events any way you can. Write a journal, take photos, shoot video, draw, paint, etc. Find a way to establish a tighter connect to what your heart desires. Need some guidance getting started? Take a quick personal inventory here.

The road of life is a journey that is full of heart pounding adrenaline pumping moments. Find what you want, and you will find all you are looking for.

What do you want?

Warning: Don’t believe this next statement unless you want to flourish.

We already know our future if we don’t continually take proactive action.

Our economic well-being demands perpetual reinvention. As the old saying goes, reinvent or die. This no longer a fancy tagline, it is required action to survive and succeed in today’s economic climate.

The days are long gone when a company could create a product and reap the rewards of its success for years to come.  Present day examples are all around you.

• Facebook was king of the castle and Twitter was the knight in shiny armor. Now there’s Google +. Remember MySpace? Me neither.
• Flip Camera ruled the pocket video cam game.  Now, your smartphone does.
• Mobile Apps are replacing websites and higher costs software programs.
• iPads are being integrated into the classroom and teaching our kids in a new way.

The list goes on and on. Product shelf lives are shrinking at a rapid pace.

New bright shiny objects capture the consumer attention faster than a speeding bullet. The masses will flock and cast aside what they once loved and cherished in favor of the new promised life-altering product. Blink and the next attraction will be on the horizon.

We already know our future if we don’t continually reinvent ourselves.

This concept does not stop at products; it extends into who you are, and what you want to be.

Look around at your co-workers, family, and friends. How many of them are doing jobs they are classically trained to do?  Are they highly skilled at their job or do their skills reside in a different area of expertise?  Are they satisfied and happy?

Chances are, these people are like most of the people I encounter every day. They are playing a role in their organization in order to survive, not thrive.

We can live a deeply meaningful life by continually reinventing ourselves.

Just like products run their course, so do roles we play in life.  We know our current role will come to an end.

Will we be ready when our new role emerges? Will it provide the deep personal meaning we are looking for?

We know everything we need to know right now to make a reasonable guess as to where things are headed.

Are you ready to reinvent?

Car chase scenes pump adrenaline rushing through my veins. There is nothing better than a well-done car chase scene. Action movie makers know how to capture this feeling with the greatest of ease.  They know how to make the audience feel alive.

Speed, destruction and thrill are the name of the game.  We immerse ourselves into the scene and vicariously participate in the action.  We want to be living on the edge of uncertainty driving the lead car.

We want to live with adrenaline rushing through our veins.

Successfully escaping pursuit cars require the driver to trust his instincts and intuition, to anticipate and make quick decisions quickly, to solely focus on escaping.

Focusing on risks or fears will surely lead to a deadly crash or capture.  Survival instincts push the pursuit car drivers into taking risks and pushing their fears aside.

The pursuit driver knows “why” he is escaping. He is emotional connected to his path and purpose.  He is not thinking about the beach he is escaping to or the meeting he had with his boss that morning. He is intensely focused on living in the present moment. Everything else is irrelevant.

Passionate action inspires and motivates the driver.

Mistakes are just another pothole in the road. There is no time to dwell on them. There is only time to proactively focus situation and recalculate his escape path.

Knowing our “why” drives us to make pursuit driver decisions, to believe we will escape our pursuers, and reach the beach of our dreams.

Without an adrenaline rush, we are just a movie goer watching the car chase scene on the big screen.

Are you chasing your dreams or are you pursuing your fears?

When we face our fears, we take control of our power. We create an opportunity for a new beginning. An opportunity to leverage up. An opportunity to go helium.

Going helium is setting your sights on the biggest dream you can imagine and going for it. I know…those big lofty dreams seem so far away from where you are at right now. They cast a long shadow and carry a heavy weight.  Big dreams don’t have to be that way.

Remember the last time you had fun..serious fun.  You lost track of time and immersed yourself in the moment. Hours went by like a moment in time. You were in flow.

Flow is a natural creative free-flowing state of being. We are connected to what we love. We are connected to our source energy.  This energy propels us forward busting through whatever obstacles are placed in our path.

The secret to getting is flow is busting through our natural innate resistance.  Resistance wants to keep us stuck in the status quo. Resistance loves the daily grind.  Resistance does not want you to break your routine and step into flow.

Resistance lives and thrives on your fear.

Fear manifests itself in many ways. When we talk about going helium, the fear language of “I’m not good enough” or “I can’t succeed” pops to the forefront. Welcome to your resistance. Say hi.

Think you are not resisting right now? We all do. What makes you unique is how your resistance controls your daily life.

Ready to take an inventory? Come on, what do you have to lose?

• Make a list of all the things you are resisting (exercising, eating healthy, career, relationship, etc.)
• Take a guess as you why you might be resisting each item
• Is there a common theme? Can you boil your resistance down to a key concept?
• How would your life change if you decided to change your approach to your resistance?
• Why is this change important to you?
• What are you going to do?

Deciding to get in the face of our resistance is a simple decision. If you think it isn’t, then you are allowing your resistance to rule the day.  Don’t  crawl up in the fetal position and surrender your life. Step up and punch resistance in the face.

Do it or don’t. There is nothing to deliberate.

Face your fears..make something wonderful happen. Push aside all the mundane superficial BS.  Find purpose and meaning. Bring your gifts to the world.

Your resistance has dominated your life long enough. It’s time for you to shine. Time for you to live the life of your dreams.

Time to for you to GO HELIUM!!

Whether we are talking about self-improvement or implementing a new product line, one thing is true, action is required.   If we don’t take action, then we are left with hope as a strategy.  Relying on hope is like standing on a rickety old three-legged chair expecting not to land on an ER stretcher.

Much of the action that takes place in the world is knee jerk reaction. This means we are already playing catch-up before we even begin.  We attempt to solve or overcome some problem without an eye on the larger overriding issues of the day.

Reactive action is a hope strategy filled with endless cycles of running in circles while choking on clouds of meaningless dust.

Warthogs are instinctively reactive animals. They have a keen ability to sniff out trouble and within a moments notice flee the scene. Moments into their reactive dusty sprint, they forget why they are running and stop cold in their tracks.

The same thing commonly occurs in business. We quickly react to a competitor’s action and just as fast deviate off our course to address something that may or may not impact our business. More importantly, this over reaction takes us further from who we are and what we are offering our customers.

Don’t be a warthog unless you like running in circles.

The way out of this dusty spiral is to get aligned with an Action Road Map.

• Ideation – Big picture idea, structured action steps for achieving
• Why – Why is this idea important? To you? To the people you serve?
• Connect – Emotionally connect your audience to your idea
• Action – Activate and empower your audience to take action

At a high level, this seems very rudimentary and that may be so. Before you completely dismiss this as more of the same, ask yourself a simple question.

Why am I living in such a reactionary world?

I promise you, the answer is not as simple as you think it is.

Solutions are simple. People make them complicated.

Need further proof, click here to find an unbelievably complex simple one-page Action Road Map.

I told you people make solutions complicated.

Do you want to learn more about how to apply these concepts to you life and your business? Send me an e-mail at david@wevivify.com

Don’t you just love action films? They accelerate our heart rate and get our adrenaline pumping. Our bodies release endorphins that excite and energize us. We get lost in the flow of the action, lose track of time, and never want the film to end.

Lost in the flow of daily life can be a lot like a good action movie.

One of my favorite icebreaker questions to ask is, what do you want to be when you grow up?

Most responses are predictable; people say they are not going to grow up.

Life does not require us to grow up.  If fact, life does not require us to do anything.

Whatever words are used to answer this question is not as important as the emotion and body language used to respond. I can begin to discern if the person is passive or aggressive in taking action for himself or herself.

We can choose to coast through our daily lives or we can work on our legacy everyday.

Thinking about our legacy is a daunting task. I thought about the subject quite a bit and I have some ideas about what my legacy might be, but I am sure they are just today’s ideas.

What I’ve figured out is my ideas are ever-changing and evolving. What I thought was most important a year ago is not something I consider as relevant today.

My final destination and contribution is largely unknown to me.

I like the mystery of the unknown. It keeps me moving forward. Keeps me in action.

Forging ahead every day is the only way I know. I push the boundaries of my comfort zone on a daily basis. I test and re-test ideas I have on as many people as I can. In the process I learn something about them and I learn something about myself.

Every action taken is a step towards fulfilling my unknown legacy.

Coasting is great for saving gas and recharging your batteries, but it is no way to live your daily life.

We have 1,440 minutes every day to take action. How many will you spend taking action towards your unknown legacy?

Will your life be an action film worth watching?

Action makes your ideas happen. Action creates momentum. Action brings the support you need to succeed.

Make that phone call. Write that blog post. Tweet that idea.

Be fearless. Share what you want.

Alternatively, you can sit on your bum and wait for the phone to ring or the support to arrive.

Life sucks when we do nothing.

Taking action is about making a choice to take action.

Will you live by your actions or be paralyzed by your inaction?

Seize the momentum. Make your ideas happen.

Take fearless action.

By doing any soul-searching, you will reach many conclusions about yourself. You will find darkness and light. You will know what feels right and what feels wrong. You will discover your pearls of wisdom. You will discover…

You are your own expert.

That’s right! Don’t let anyone tell you any different.

Think about all the brilliant stuff you know. Think about all the stuff you know your spouse doesn’t know. Your co-workers don’t know. Your friends don’t know.

I’ll bet you take all this wisdom for granted. You freely share it and don’t even think twice about it.

Go-ahead…take a moment and reflect on what I just said.

What do you take for granted?

I’m no different from you. I freely dispense perils of wisdom all day long. Things I take for granted are moments of insight for others.

In a Twitter chat this week, I challenged a thought with this tweet:

@davidmcgraw: people are complicated, problems are not

Notice the smiley face at the end.  Even in that moment, I said it in jest. I took for granted the brilliance of my wisdom. I brushed it off as common well-known wisdom everyone knows.

This tweet was re-tweeted multiple times with some accolades. Clearly my common well-known wisdom was thought-provoking and additive to the conversation.

Sharing my wisdom allowed me to contribute to the conversation in ways that I could not have imagined when I sent the tweet.

If I lived by the premise, my knowledge is just common well-known wisdom; I would have assumed people already knew what I am about to say and never sent the tweet.

Can you imagine what I would have missed out on?  I would have missed out on the conversation. I would have missed out on building new relationships. I would have missed out on recognizing my own wisdom is not common knowledge.  I would have missed out on sharing this with you.

Have the courage to share your knowledge and wisdom. Embrace your own expertise. Sharing will benefit you in ways you cannot imagine.

Now is your chance. The comment fields are wide open.

What will you share?