08 Nov The sun will still rise tomorrow

Habits, like the sun rise, are about rhythm

1. Understand your motivation for changing your routine or habits
2. Participation trumps Perfection – stay in the game, get back up on the horse
3. Each sun rise reminds us of a new day, a fresh beginning

Every morning, when we wake up, we have twenty-four brand-new hours to live. What a precious gift! We have the capacity to live in a way that these twenty-four hours will bring peace, joy, and happiness to ourselves and others.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

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 I see promise in each new sunrise.

My recent post ‘This day has 25 hours‘ generated a flurry of emails, conversations and phone calls.  It was wonderful to hear how some of you carve some time for yourself, and where you invest it:

• Creating art
• Writing a gratitude journal
• Sleeping – consciously enjoying extra time in bed
• Working on a novel
• Planning the day
• Treadmill
• 5-minute yoga routine

Creating the habit

On average, those who responded had a 3/5 success ratio.  Few among us are able to consistently keep our commitment to ourselves 7/7 – life, kids, work just have this habit of getting in our way.

But it is all about getting back on the horse.  And the best way to ensure that happens is to examine WHY you are doing something, not WHAT you are doing.

“Get a C”

When starting a new habit, aim for participation marks, not perfection!  Keep a tool such as the Seinfeld calendar where you can visually track your progress.

My blog posts in November are part of that commitment to myself.  I aim to post on Monday and Thursday every week.  There – I said it out loud and in public!  It is to exercise my writing muscles, get back into the groove and create a community where we are comfortable sharing common problems, unusual ideas and taking risks.  (See the Lisa Bloom reference to JK Rowling in the inspiration section below).

Today I am testing out the use of video in my blog and using it to answer your question and tell the story of the what and the why about my extra early morning hour.

Breakfast & Sunrises

What gets me out of my warm bed an hour early on a cold Canadian winter morning is the opportunity to share breakfast with my children, as an experience.  To see them, chat with them, watch them, touch them, bless them as they start their day.  Because all too soon, these days will pass.

And when I can sneak it in and time it correctly, I love watching the sun rise.  My favorite spot is on a ridge overlooking the lake.  My days that start with watching the sun rise invariably ripple up richer in experience for me.  They have a better rhythm and are more productive.

10 reasons I love the sun rise

1. Connecting with nature
2. Taking a moment to myself
3. Listening to uplifting music
4. Reminds me that life, like nature, has a rhythm – day, then night; dark, then light; cold, then warm; wrong, then right.  This gives me hope on darker days.
5. Replenishing my energy bank with a fresh 24 hours of time to play with
6. Marveling at the human eye and the brain as what is visible expands with the increasing intensity of light (shine a light on it!)
7. Reminds me of my place in the Book of Life, where the sun has risen and set for million years – and will continue to rise and set for a million more
8. Watching the sun rise over the horizon.  Open horizons, open skies, unlimited opportunity
9. The sun always rises no matter what has happened the night before: dinosaur destruction, weddings, ice ages, 30th birthdays, war, BrExit, elections
10. A sunrise is my gift from God for another chance, another opportunity, another beginning

K‘}…{‘Arena

The Arena is a space for ideas and discussion.  So over to you:

} .. Do you have a secret pleasure that helps pick you up and put you back on track?

} .. If you also chase sunrises or sunsets please share your favorite photo on my FaceBook page TheKarenaArena

HOPE FOR THE BEST, PLAN FOR THE REST

Whether it is time management, money matters or career ideas, Karena works with her community of clients to make life simpler and more efficient by bringing an uncommon perspective to what is common.

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THANKS FOR THE INSPIRATION

• To all who called or emailed me, especially the reader who asked “What do you do with your hour? And how do you keep motivated?”
• To write regularly – Lisa Bloom, The Story Coach and her post on JK Rowling’s solution to writer’s block – keep a rhythm
• For the courage to test out video in my blog – Brad Powell, AwesomeVideomakers.com and his free video simplified series
• “Get a C’.  Show up.  Just do the work.  Sam Bennett, The Organized Artist Company, in her book “Get It Done“

TECH

• Photos on the video are mine, shot with a Samsung Galaxy S5
• Photo Editor: Pixlr to straighten some photos
• Video Editor: YouTube Video Editor