Happy Friday — I hope it’s a joyful one!
Here’s an idea, exercise, and resource to spark curiosity, consciousness, and change.
Curious
Idea from me about prioritizing consumer-friendly ideas:
Single-use products are not environmentally friendly. Single-mind ideas are not consumer-friendly.
Single-mind ideas are how I refer to those that come from an individual’s experience or bias but are prescribed as universal truths.
These ideas might include phrases like:
“Success is…”
“You must do it this way…”
“This is the only way you will…”
“By the age of X… you should be doing Y”
“Happiness is…”
This isn’t an exhaustive list of single-mind phrases, but I’m confident you’ve consumed some variation of them.
Sharing experiences isn’t the problem. The issue is in how they are communicated.
There isn’t one style of playing football, painting a picture, or making music.
How we live is no different.
What works for you may not work for everyone.
Life has too many layers and textures for a rigid one-size-fits-all approach.
Many of the “absolute truths” we are told throughout our lives are in reality social myths.
Consumer-friendly ideas stimulate curiosity.
Rather than prescribe what worked for you — think about how you can communicate it in a way that inspires the consumer.
The best coaches, teachers, leaders, and creators role model this concept.
Conscious
Exercise to help you prioritize focus:
In an interview with a certified meditation teacher, Olivia Wu — I asked her to share a practice that helps ground her at any time.
Keep an eye out for a future email with more from my conversation with Olivia.
Her message was:
Keep it simple.
Take one deep breath.
Conscious breathing is often overlooked in periods of stress, and when strong emotions like fear, or anger arise.
Taking one deep breath can help settle you enough to remain in control.
Novak Djokovic is an elite tennis player and is well-known for his mental strength.
When tensions rise in-game, Novak reverts to conscious breathing as one of his main tools to dilute emotion and stay locked in.
After you read the rest of this email, watch him talk about it in this short interview.
Exercise: What daily tasks require your full focus? How can you use conscious breathing to ground yourself in those moments?
When you give this exercise a go — send me a message about how it went for you.
Change
Resource to make it easier for you to prioritize calmness:
“The only thing that can break a spell is to make a new agreement.” - Don Miguel Ruiz
‘The Four Agreements’ by Don Miguel Ruiz offers a simple code of conduct to live with less stress and more freedom.
The Four Agreements
Don’t take anything personally
Don’t make assumptions
Be impeccable with your word
Always do your best
The ideas are easy to digest, and benefit me when I keep them top of mind. (highlight ‘when’ in that sentence)
Let me know if you read it and what feedback you have.
Live Free,
Niall
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Oooh I saw you use that DM button already. I haven't tried that feature yet.
As for the idea, I'm guilty as charged of putting up 'hooks' on my posts often: this is the way you should do X, you're missing out if you don't Y, and so on.
I should stop listening to the hook recommendation from the marketers, tbh...
Thanks, Niall.
I am a highly sensitive person, so I take everything personally. This is a therapeutic issue, of which I am aware and to which I take my injured feelings. But it's not necessarily something one can control through consciousness alone.
My daily life involves raising 5 humans, ages 13 down to 4. Three of them are neurodivergent, so that makes my task as their mom now complicated and, for me, draining.
My husband also travels frequently for work, leaving me a single mom.
What I do each day is take small, frequent breaks to sit down in silence, walk my dog outside for fifteen minutes, read, journal, nap, listen to music. These are ways I recharge myself and my energy, plus they are calming, regulating my nervous system.