Ash Lawrence

Become a Palm Tree......

You’re at the beach. The warning signs are there. The birds are flying away. The animals are moving away from the beach. A hurricane is about to land, and it’s coming in with gale force winds plus 100mph. The palm tree says, “What’s the problem? Come on in.” It absorbs the wrath of the storm. It absorbs the 100 mph winds, and it bends, but doesn’t break and doesn’t brace the storm at all, doesn’t fight it, but lets it completely go through it. And then when it blows itself out, the palm tree pops back up and says, “Hey, sunshine, how’re doing?”

Most of us in life do not act like a palm tree. When something happens that we don’t like, we cross our arms, brace ourselves and, in many cases, throw out a tit for tat. Okay, well, that happened to me. Well, this is what I think about you.

But you know what? That’s not the palm tree.

When you have a negative, verbally or physically coming at you, so for just 60 seconds, become the palm tree. Lower your breathing. Get it to six to eight breaths a minute as quickly as you can.

Make no reaction and absorb the negativity. Just let it pass through. Acknowledge that you understand what the person is saying.

Now, once you’ve been the palm tree for 60 seconds, when the hurricane force is blowing itself out, now you can come back and make your point.

Be a palm tree when you drive in your car.

Be a palm tree in a traffic jam, on the motorway.

Be a palm tree in any confrontation with another human being. Learn to relax during these specific times of stress.

Is it any wonder that there are no oak trees on beaches?

It's your life, it's your choice... Make a choice to be flexible....

Stuff......

I've been to the funeral today of my best mates dad, a man I have know for over 40 years. While I was listening to his eulogy I thought to myself "where have all those years gone?"

It reminded me of that old saying "The best things in life are free!" And the complete realisation that the best things in life are actually not things.

Things are just stuff and we all have more than enough "Stuff."

Elephants........

As a man was passing the elephants, he suddenly stopped, confused by the fact that these huge creatures were being held by only a small rope tied to their front leg. No chains, no cages. It was obvious that the elephants could, at anytime, break away from their bonds but for some reason, they did not.

He saw a trainer nearby and asked why these animals just stood there and made no attempt to get away. “Well,” trainer said, “when they are very young and much smaller we use the same size rope to tie them and, at that age, it’s enough to hold them. As they grow up, they are conditioned to believe they cannot break away. They believe the rope can still hold them, so they never try to break free.”

The man was amazed. These animals could at any time break free from their bonds but because they believed they couldn’t, they were stuck right where they were.

Like the elephants, how many of us go through life hanging onto a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we failed at it once before?

Failure is part of growing. What beliefs are you hanging onto that could be holding you back?

Your life, your choice....

Say what you do, do what you say.......

Recently I’ve been out visiting different network meetings, mainly to see how other people do it and if necessary bring my own network up to scratch.

One of the main things I’ve noticed and quite frankly has shocked me is the number of people that make promises that they don’t keep.

Why would they say one thing and do something different? It appears to me that this phenomenon is endemic among small business owners.

Now, I say to myself, there is no such thing as coincidence, so where else is this showing up in their lives? It can’t just be a one off!

When we don’t follow through on things that we promise to do, it not only shows disrespect but also destroys trust. Who wants to do business with someone they don’t trust, and more to the point in the context of networking would you refer someone you don’t trust?

What is it that makes them over promise and under deliver? Is it the fact that they want us to have a positive and favourable opinion of them? This seems to be a pointless exercise as after all, we will find out at a later time that they don’t deliver on their promises.

Ash’s first rule of life and business…”Say what you do, do what you say.” If you can’t follow through with the action, don’t make the promise.

Your mission for this week is to see where you are following through on your promises, how ever small they may be.

As Yoda once said “Either do or do not, there is no try.”

It’s your life, it’s your choice.