Reader Lenka sent me this video the other day – she thought I might appreciate it. And boy howdy was she right!
It’s a smidge over 3 minutes and incredibly inspiring – I couldn’t really say it better myself. Turn up the volume on your computer and click the big ‘play’ button.
If for any reason you can’t see or hear the video, drop me a line.
The rather wonderful thing about Now Lists is that it seems there’s very little that can go wrong! So far there’s only a
handful of challenges that I’ve identified. Here’s the first of two.
Money. Or the lack thereof.
If your Now List is anything like mine there probably isn’t an item on the list that doesn’t involve parting with money. Which is annoying if you’re strapped for cash, or on a particularly tight budget.
Now you might be tempted to avoid adding items to your list if they seem financially out of reach, but that would be a mistake – any kind of censorship will only stifle your creativity. Instead, create a Now List category called ‘when I have enough money’ and add them anyway.
You might also want to consider starting a ‘Now List Fund’.
How you do that is entirely up to you. If you’re like me setting up a ‘fund’ might only involve adding a line to spreadsheet somewhere, but if you’re a normal person, or someone who struggles to manage their finances, it might be better to open a savings account, and maybe even one that doesn’t give you a cash card or internet banking or any other easy way to access your money. You’ll want to put your Now List Fund out of easy reach.
You might also need to find creative ways of topping it up.
Jules (my long suffering assistant) has a standing order set up to automatically put a small amount into her dedicated savings account each month. Even if you can only afford one pound/dollar/euro/drakma per month it’s one pound/dollar/euro/drakma in the right direction.
Personally I top up my Now List Fund whenever I’m given “unexpected” money (eg. if I win a tenner on the lottery or a premium bond pays out). But I also make my Now List available on the blog and on BucketList.org and as a consequence family and friends often consult the list when looking for Birthday or Christmas gift ideas.
Sometimes the thing that’s making you unhappy is staring you right in the face. People might tell you that you need to relax more, calm down, try not to take things personally, roll with the punches, “make lemonade when life gives you lemons”, but sometimes – that’s not going to cut it.
Sometimes, it isn’t you.
Sometimes it really is them.
Let’s take a look at who they are
For me, ‘Other People’ have more power than anything else to drain my enthusiasm and suck the pleasure out of life.
It isn’t always the people you think it would be either. Sure, the angry idiot who gestured at me from his car as he drove past took the edge off what might have been a pleasant drive home, but he’s soon forgotten, and I can take solace in the fact that by the way he’s driving he’ll probably wrap his car around a tree in the not too distant future.
No, the people who really have the power to make me really unhappy are either people who I care about, or people who are in some way, important in my life.
We all have them: The manager you don’t get on with – one who seems intent on making your life a misery. The ex-partner you still have to see at family gatherings. Less extreme but just as soul destroying might be the moody work colleague you have to tip toe around. Or the aged relative who you love dearly, but has started to take you for granted.
Sometimes it isn’t the interaction with these people, but the lack thereof. Like the client or a supplier who never returns your calls, never answers your emails, and is somehow never in the office when you ‘pop by’. Or the friend or sibling who is so wrapped up in themselves that after an hour or so in their company you really begin to wonder whether all you are is some sort of audience.
Then there are the corporations, companies and government bodies that determine the structure in which we live. Rarely does a day go by when I haven’t got to deal with an some brow-beaten representative from a corporation or organisation that really couldn’t give two figs about whatever my plight might be.
Sometimes, it feels as if these organisations must be run by people who’s entire aim in life is to make as much money as possible, by any means, but without bringing the slightest bit of joy to anyone involved in the process. And having worked for a number of such organisations I can divulge that this is indeed the case.
That’s just me of course.
So in order to make this section a little more rounded I decided to conduct a quick poll by email with a view to coming up with half a dozen broad sub categories of what brings people down.
That may have been a mistake.
In the last two minutes I’ve been so overwhelmed with ranting emails that instead of depressing both you and myself, I’m just going to list a tiny extract of the items that made me smile or had me bouncing up and down in agreement.
External Forces – popular culprits
Doubtless you’ll have your own items that you can add to that list. Feel free to add them here using the comments section below.
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