Exiting the Cocoon
In the past two months, I’ve had more sadness and anxiety than I’ve ever felt my adult life. I had to take a lot of time to think, meditate, and exercise to finally gain some clarity. The more clarity I gain, the more I realize I don’t know anything. There are so many questions to ask so much more to learn.
In my next few posts I will focus on the main lessons I have learned over the past couple months. For now, I’d like to share a few realizations that have helped me tremendously.
- Meditation is key to be able to take on the day with an open mind and heart. Being able to clear my head each morning, before I do anything else, has been so critical to gain a sense of clarity. I meditated almost every day for over 4 months while we traveled, but when we returned I said I didn’t “need” that anymore, I’ve already figured everything out. Boy, was I wrong. Meditation is proving to be one of the foundations of my life.
- Exercise on a regular basis provides some amazing benefits. I have been running stairs down at the beach about 1 mile from the house. I walk there, ride my bike there or park near the stairs to run them. Combine that with the walk or bike ride and that’s a great workout. I also continue to play volleyball each Sunday. One result is getting under 200 lbs for the first time in over 30 years.
- Healthy food and small portions. My diet, including eating better and less quantities made a significant difference for me. As my mood and my anxiety changed, so did my appetite. Over the past week or so my appetite has returned and I need to monitor that to keep excess weight off to continue a healthy lifestyle.
- Hiring a coach. Paying someone to provide solid feedback, keep me focused and accountable has been extremely valuable. One of the key inputs from my coach is tracking all of the changes I was making, including my daily steps, my sleep patterns and reading really positive books and other content.
- Sleep, and consistent sleep is critical to mental and physical health. Developing good sleep patterns and understanding how to quiet my mind before going to sleep has made a huge difference in my overall well-being.
- Yes, I have an ego and it was really controlling me and driving my behavior. Over the past few weeks I have started to shift conversations totally to the other person. This is not my natural way of being, but it’s critical to success. I catch myself getting caught talking about me and my accomplishments, but that was what I believe was the biggest cause of my challenges and the biggest lesson that I’ve learned. In the end, it’s not about us, it’s about what gifts we were given that we can deliver to the world.
Over the past year, I’ve been looking for needles in a haystack, those purposeful business owners who want to learn from peers that are also purposeful. What I’ve learned is that I don’t need to sell purpose, I just need to be purposeful in my own work. With that in mind, the past few months have caused me to re-evaluate my gifts and figure out what I’m world class at, and how can I provide that to others. I believe that gift is my business development skills and connecting people together.
With these lessons and learning, a new opportunity has been born. I’m focused on using my gifts to the best of my ability and helping others live the life they were meant to live. As we help others get what they want, we can get so much more than we need.
To connecting the dots …. one dot at a time!
Larry Kesslin 