Monthly Archive

I nicked this shortstory from here . Richard Brodie certainly have some interesting thoughts.

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One
of the cornerstones of Level-3 living is having a life purpose. My life
purpose is the most important priority in my life. I can and do have other
priorities, so in order to accomplish them and be true to myself I need to
arrange my life so that I do them at the same time as I am living my life
purpose.

Suppose
you’re driving down an unfamiliar highway. In the car with you are the people
closest to you. It’s getting late, and you have a long way to go, and you’re
getting hungry. You need to choose a restaurant to stop and have dinner, but
you don’t know what lies ahead. You keep passing restaurants, but none of
them clearly jumps out at you as the place to eat. You want to stop
someplace decent, maybe even the best place possible. How do you decide?

There
is actually a mathematical formula for maximizing your chance of eating at
the best restaurant. If you estimate the total number of restaurants on the
road and divide by e (approximately 2.7), then that is the number of
restaurants you should check out before stopping at the next one that’s better
than any of those. But for this to work, you have to really examine all those
first few restaurants. For instance, if you estimate 81 restaurants on the
highway ahead, you really need to examine those first 30 to give you an
informed choice over the final 51.

Suppose
you live to be 81. The more fully you participate in those first 30 years of
life, the more apparent your life purpose will become when you decide to
uncover it. My life purpose is like a Zagat Guide to the restaurants of life.
It’s a guide that only applies to me. If I’m unclear about my life purpose,
the only way to discover it is by playing hard—fully immersing myself in the
parts of life that attract me. Playing it safe and being a spectator are just
ways of marking time, of passing restaurants without gaining either food or
knowledge.

A
life purpose is not a mission. It is a direction, a priority. It pertains
more to life’s quality than to the quantity of my accomplishments, yet by
being clear about my life purpose I will leave a trail of accomplishment that
I am proud of. A life purpose is not a statement of the way I desire to
contribute to the world. It is my contribution to the world. By
expressing myself fully, I fulfill my place in the world to the betterment of
all those who come in contact with me. But their betterment is not my
purpose.

Living
my life purpose is easy. It requires courage because I must face guilt (an
emotion that indicates I am going against my cultural indoctrination about
how I should be) and resentment (likewise, an emotion indicative of a
violation of cultural programming regarding how others ought to be). It
requires consciousness to maintain focus in the face of life’s attractive
nuisances such as TV, power games, and spectator sports. But it’s easy.
There’s no will power involved in living my life purpose. When I’m
doing it, it feels good and right. I could do it for hours and days on end
and never get tired.

Saying
I don’t have a life purpose is like saying I’m not going to stop at a
restaurant and eat. At the end, I’ll be hungry, frustrated, and more confused
than ever. Pick a place.

From:Richard Brodie, http://www.memecentral.com/L3Restaurant.htm

Tension is building up. People nervously running around. Last minute preparations. Butterflies in the stomack. Heart beating.

3 - 2 - 1 and START

Yes! We did it!!

-- Post From My iPhone

It is a great honor to be in Riga, Latvia to train the new generation of JCI trainers.

This image shows Per Stilling, the head trainer, and Aldis Alliks.

Over the next days we will spend time to develop their skills, knowledge and behaviors.

In this picture JCI Latvia National President 2009 Agnese Kulina-Stomere is showing how to use unusual objects and resources in a training.

-- Post From My iPhone

I am currently in Riga, Latvia, being head trainer on JCI Presenter. The trainer team includes Agate from JCI Latvia, and Lina from JCI Syria.

On this picture Lina is doing the introdution of the training, clearifying the expectations of the participants.

The participants have fun and challenges over the day, and now they are getting ready to do their main presentation! Lot of tension is building up - only to be released later today.

-- Post From My iPhone

I am preparing a trip to Riga, Latvia. I will be HT of JCI Presenter friday, and assist Per Stilling on JCI Trainer saturday and sunday. After this weekend I will become Head Trainer on JCI Trainer too!

I plan to post images and updates throughout the weekend!

-- Post From My iPhone

This is a test from my iPhone to see how it is as a blogging tool.

So far, so good!

-- Post From My iPhone

This easter I went to the northern parts of Norway to visit my sister. The region is truly beautiful, and I get amazed everytime I visit. As always with me, the weather was perfect. Sun created a spring time feeling out the ordinary.

One of the days, I decided to go to a nearby peak, a lovely summit called Fugltind (Bird summit). The summit is at  1033m above the sea, and you can reach it from the fjord. 

On this trip, I had my oldest nephew, and my ex-brother in law. Our goal was to reach the top, and enjoy the day being out in the snow. Using ski and carrying chocolate and food, we started our expedition in the morning. We where all alone, sun was heating and we enjoyed the slopes up from the valley. 

My to companions did lack some of the skills of skiing, but they had plenty of motivation. After aproximately one hour, we made a mistake, and discovered that we had went too far north. Correcting our route, we turned westward and started climbing the summit from the north side - the side you see on the image above. 

We climbed diagonally, in southbound direction, and finally reached the area where it would be possible to climb to the top. Just about 100 meters below the summit, we took a break and had a brief talk. We assessed the conditions, our equipment (that was not made for this kind of skiing), and the skiing skills of the group. And we desided that the safest option today would be to turn around and enjoy the skiing back down without broken legs. 

This trip to the mountains reminded me of a training I once participated in, where we used a mountain as the picture of our personal or group goal. The road to the summit would take us past falling rocks, up steep hillsides, and it would be long and testing. 

In order to succeed, you needed to prepare. Set up the right team, find the common motivation to walk all the way, and to go through the challenges you would meet on the way to your goal. 

On the moutain trip, I experienced that allthough we did not reach the summit, we did reach our goal. We wanted to spend a day together, enjoying nature, sun and snow. We wanted to have fun, and to prise the life we live. And we wanted to see how far we could reach with the kind of equipment we had available. 

In my opinion, goals are moving as we reach them. Some are fixed, like a summit, while others are more fluid. And as soon as we get close enough to the goal, we realize that it may not be as important anymore, that other things are more vital to us. And many times I discover that when one goal is reached, a new one is coming up behind it.

I cannot imagine my life without a goal, or a series of goals. I cannot imagine what to do, had I not had goals, visions and dreams. Yes, they change over time. As do my priorities. That comes with experience.

Just like knowing when to turn around instead of pursuing the summit. 

This is a lovely shortfilm about how you influence your surroundings!

Thanks Lina!