Pockets of Routine

Delicious granola I had today – totally irrelevant to this post but absolutely worth posting because it’s so pretty!

Traveling has thrown my habits far off balance, and it really makes me think about how important routine is for habit formation. But a lot of the time, we don’t have a constant routine. Solution?

Create pockets of routine.

No matter where you wake up, do a one-minute meditation. No matter when you go to sleep, say something you’re grateful for. (These are just examples, not a prescription.)

I’m going to try to build more pockets of routine into my day, so I’ll let you know how it goes - off to do some push-ups now.

Just call me Tiger

Impossible goals or impossible holes?

This was my first ever time picking up a proper golf club (and not a mini golf club), and it was in what you might call the most impossible setting. What are the actual chances of me getting that ball even near the green, let alone into the hole? It doesn’t matter the chances if you’ve got an impossible goal. But the real question to ask is, do I even want to get it into the hole?

I think this fits a metaphor: Make sure you’re going after the right impossible goal. I’ve been reflecting on this recently – which, if any, of my impossible goals are actually for someone else to take on? Which, if any, of my impossible goals aren’t the right ones for me?

For example, I’ve been thinking about the way I’ve set up my impossible goals. For example, I have a goal of reaching 100k subscribers on YouTube. Would 99k suffice? 101k? Why 100k? Do I care about the number? Or do I care about the actual experience? Would it make more sense to readjust my goal to making 100 impactful videos? Or impacting 100 people’s lives deeply? Don’t get me wrong – I’m not giving up on my goals at all. I’m as driven and dedicated to them as possible. I’m simply examining the goal post. We all know the story of the person who got everything they ever wanted, it just turns out they wanted all the wrong things.

No changes yet – just food for thought.

Gorgeous day

There are hundreds of pictures from my uncle’s amazing wedding, I truly don’t even know where to begin. I will write another post with all of them, but for now, I’ll just share this one picture, and leave it until I’ve got the photos ready to share a proper wedding post!

I had a really interesting conversation with my cousins, aunts and uncle’s today at the celebrations about aspirational lifestyles, and what it’s like to post things online, what’s real, what’s fake, what’s in between – and most importantly, where we stand on the morality of it all. For example, this picture above could easily be taken out of context to look like our own wedding photo. I think everyone has heard the “social media is fake” argument, so that’s not what I want to say here. I’m actually thinking more about portraying an image of oneself online. Is it possible to portray a true projection of yourself? Should you even try? Can we even do it in real life? Why do we try to make project an image of ourselves at all? I don’t have answers to these questions right now, but it’s something I’m keen to dive deeper into and share conversations with people about. All thoughts are welcome – in the comments, in a message or via email!

AKL > WLG

My cousin’s beautiful girlfriend, Julie. How delish is this hotel room?

We flew from Auckland to Wellington today for my uncle’s wedding tomorrow! I’m seriously excited to see everyone, there’s people coming from all over the world – different parts of Asia, USA, Europe, UK, Australia and everywhere in New Zealand.

I mentioned in yesterday’s post how its been a bit tricky staying on top of my good habits while travelling, so I’m determined to get back into a good routine tomorrow.

Tomorrow’s plan:

• Sleep in (I’m a little jet lagged)

• Meditate

• Gratitude journal

• Workout, including push ups (and then I’ve earned my shower!)

• Café trip (this is guaranteed if you’re with my family, haha!)

• Get dressed up for the wedding

• Taking a million family photos

• Wedding ceremony

• Dancing

• Blog

• More dancing(?)
  

  That is, if it all goes to plan (everything could easily change, family events tend to be chaos!).

Habit update

We arrived into NZ absolutely exhausted but super happy to be here! We are here for my Uncle’s wedding and I’m absolutely ridiculously excited to see everyone. I thought I’d give you a habit update today because I do quite a few things every single day, and I realise I don’t share my progress of them enough.

• Fear of Flying: totally amazing. I’m so so so grateful I stumbled upon a way to overcome this. London to Auckland is almost one of the longest flight times and layovers you can take in the world, and in the past I have found these terrifying. The combination of fear, exhaustion, bad plane food (or no plane food, if they didn’t get our request for vegan meals) and stress used to be a recipe for a major internal meltdown. I used to find it excruciating to fly, especially on my own. I’m actually writing this in the sky on our domestic flight from Auckland to Wellington, during some pretty intense turbulence! But this entire trip, I felt happy, free and safe the whole time. I’m so relieved I’m done with being afraid! If you have any questions about how I overcame my fear want or to chat about it (for free of course) email me at hello@saraharnoldhall.com.
  

• 100 Push Ups: I was considering doing some push ups in the airport but I was just so sleepy I didn’t manage any at all. I’m a little nervous about achieving my October goal of 25 push ups in a row, as I’ve really been pretty slack on it. I received the most lovely email from someone telling me they’re enjoying my push ups journey and that I should make vlogs on the days I train. What do you guys think? Would you want to watch them?
  
  365 Days of Meditation: Currently on day 208. This morning I saw my aunt’s meditation space/sanctuary with pillows, prayer flags and candles, and it was so cosy! I realised I’d like to make a dedicated meditation space in our house at home too, because it will also make it easier for me to define what actually “counts” as having meditated that day. Every time I tried to meditate on the flights to NZ I just fell asleep, haha! I still managed to get a few minutes on each flight though, so that’s good. I’m working on making this habit more about really enjoying doing it, and less about just ticking it off my daily to do list.

• No complaining for 21 days: I don’t complain a lot, but occasionally I’ll notice a complaint just slip out, which is the whole idea behind doing this challenge – to train my brain not to allow negative thinking on the automatic program it runs. I’ve had to restart a bunch of times (15, to be exact), but I do think I’m becoming more aware of it. If I’m honest with myself, I haven’t been totallly dedicated setting the intention to not complain daily, which is why I think I haven’t seen the progress I’d like. I’ve been doing it for 56 days and currently on day 6 of no complaining (since I start again each time I complain). The longest I’ve gone without complaining is 10 days (almost half way to the goal!).
  

• Running before showering/earning my showers. Flying really threw me off this actually, for the first time. However, I think it’s really important to make planned exceptions, and I knew flying would, so I did. I made the exception that I could shower before and after the flights without exercising, just to reduce any unnecessary stress or exhaustion. What’s really important is that I made these exceptions BEFOREHAND - not in the moment. That way, I know I’m not just being lazy or making excuses. Tomorrow is the wedding and it’s tempting to just have a shower first thing, but nope! I’m going to do a workout (especially working on push ups) first.
  

• Gratitude journal: Okay, this one I have been shocking at. There’s no sugar-coating it. I just haven’t made it a priority, which needs to change. I’ve just downloaded an app to answer my questions on there instead. I’m making a commitment to do it tomorrow morning!
  

• Daily blogging for two years: This a habit I have been very dedicated with, aside from time when I was flying and physically couldn’t post. I’m not sure if the content I’m creating is resonating with people, but I’m just going to keep going until I find my groove. The thing that I’m working on the most right now is posting better photos with my written content. I have dreams of photographing more beautiful shots for this blog, as there are many blogs I follow with stunning photographic content and I think it really enhances the blog overall.

Lost a day

We actually lost a day coming to NZ because of the time zones, so Wednesday didn’t really exist in my world! I’m posting this afterwards though - now that I’m in NZ and have wifi. On the flight I spent most of the time listening to podcasts, as well as brainstorming business ideas – I an idea that I want to release some of my exclusive content that’s usually just for my paying clients. It will be coming your way soon 😍 

If you’re a podcast person, read on. If not, feel free to skip this blog and check out another one of my many, many daily blogs (I’m blogging daily for two years straight!).

The podcasts I listened to and my takeaways:

The Life Coach School Podcast, Episode 190: Lessons from Frank Kern.

I am OBSESSED with this podcast. At first I thought it would be so cheesy because the name “The Life Coach School” is super generic. But now I’ve listened to dozens of episodes and it’s totally changed my outlook on many things, money in particular. I can’t recommend it enough, whether if you’re interested in Life Coaching or not. This episode was a Frank Kern is an online “Every business problem is just a math problem.” - Brooke Castillo (she’s the creator the Life Coach School). I love this so much. It’s really just a numbers game - e.g. how many people, how many goals, how much value, how much profit, etc. Everything else is just drama. And when you can focus on the marketing like it’s just math and drop the drama then you can let go of the stress and get back to actually helping your clients or customers. I needed to hear this!

Magic Lessons, Episode 208: ‘Leap into the Fire’ featuring Martha Beck. 

Paraphrasing: “They told me I was throwing my life away if I had this baby. And I said yes, I am throwing my life away, and thank god because it was awful.”

I’ve never heard “throwing your life away” used in a positive sense before. How amazing is that? Maybe throwing your current life away is the best thing you can do right now. Makes me think about the things in life that might need throwing away. Expired ideas, beliefs, values, even toxic relationships.

Lewis Howes, The School of Greatness Podcast: Marianne Williamson on Running for President.

As a NZ citizen, I don’t have the ability to vote in the US election, however, I am really excited about Marianne running for President. She would be phenomenal. I’ve followed her as a spiritual teacher for many years, and my mum used to have her famous quote on the wall as a kid.

These words I can recite from heart:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?”

One thing I adore about Marianne is that she really knows what she’s talking about. She didn’t just wake up one morning, cut and past a few ideas together, and decide to run for president. She has been doing her incredible work for over 50 years! She essentially wants a moral revolution. She wants to begin a Department of Peace in the government. She wants free education. She wants rights for women and people in poverty. Marianne, I hope you win!

GTW > TPE

We’re New Zealand bound! We’re heading there for my uncle’s wedding, which we are SO excited about. It’s an opportunity to see so many family members and definitely do a lot of group dancing (which if you know me, you’ll know is pretty much my favourite activity of all time).

Today we left for Taipei, which was an 11 hour flight, and now 6 hour layover before 14 hour flight to Auckland. People who live in NZ or Australia know this is normal, but if you live in a country close to other countries, I know it might seem like a lot to travel for two days straight from door to door!

I’m stocked up with personal development Podcasts and books to keep me sane during the journey (of course – what else would I do?!), and have enough instant noodles to feed us for 3 days (seriously – because sometimes we don’t receive our vegan meals if there’s a flight change so we have to be prepared!). Luckily, we found these amazing Lazyboy chairs in Taipei because the airport was deserted, and I slept really well.

See you on the flip side – of the world!

Burn the boats, not the weapons

If you want to take the island, you have to burn the boats.

Today I have lost my voice (been doing far too much talking!). So lucky this isn’t a daily vlog or I would have nothing to say! I was just on a coaching call with one of my clients, and we were talking about something Tony Robbins shares all the time: If you want to take the island, you have to burn the boats.

(This quote comes from the story of when Julius Caesar set out to conquer England - he knew that in order to win the battle and take the island, he would have to convince his soldiers that there was no other option. So he ordered them to burn their boats once they arrived, so if they ever wanted to go home to Rome, they would have to conquer England. And despite being a much smaller army, they won.)

In other words, if you want to go after your dreams (e.g. entrepreneurship), let go of the things that are keeping you comfortable (e.g. a job).

HOWEVER:

Here’s an important distinction that I think hasn’t been made. Please don’t confuse burning the boats with burning your weapons. Don’t go into battle in a t-shirt and shorts, like I did.

When I first started my business, I thought I was burning the boats, but what I was really doing was burning my weapons.

Yes, I quit my job, just like I was told I needed to do. I wasn’t going to build a successful business if I was comfortable in my job, and that is true.

But then I went and burned my weapons (aka, my investment capital).

I invested it (and I’m glad I did), but the problem was, I invested every last penny of it. And then I was left with zero dollars to push my business forward. Zero dollars to attack with. So I had no money and no job, and instead of feeling powerful like Caesars soldiers, I felt overcome by anxiety and crippled with the ever surmounting pressure.

Yes, burn your comforts. But don’t burn your tools.

If you want to quit your job to start a business – do it. But ONLY if you have sufficient weapons. And the moment you run out of ammo, you better go get you some more any possible way that you can. Take that advice from a girl who’s been there!

Impossible indicator

I have this one coaching client I know without a doubt is going to succeed with her impossible goal. For a while, I used to just have an intuitive sense about who would succeed and who wouldn’t. But after coaching a lot of people and self-coaching too, I’ve learned that my intuition can detect the level of determination someone has, and that’s really it. It depends how determined someone is. It depends how strong their WHY is. This client of mine I know she is going to succeed because her why is so strong. In our first session she told me she basically sees not succeeding in her goal as worse than dying. At first my reaction was “uh oh, what if she doesn’t achieve it? She will be distraught.” And then I almost laughed at myself out loud, because that’s the whole damn point — it’s that exact answer that proves certain she will achieve it. She wants her impossible more than she wants anything else in the world, including comfort right now. She wants it more than 10/10. She wants it more than she wants to BREATHE. I’m in awe of her gumption and passionate determination.

This made me think about an assessment to see if you’ll achieve your goals. 

Here’s my work-in-progress assessment.

Let’s call it the Impossible Indicator.

There are two questions:

1. Why do you want your impossible goal?

2. What are you willing to do to get it?

If your answer to number 1 doesn’t make your whole body shake with excitement and your heart beat with exhilaration (and terror), then you need to come up with a stronger why.

If your answer to number 2 isn’t “anything and everything — whatever it takes”, please revise your answer to number 1.

Cardiff

Today we spent the day with Daniel’s new baby cousin, he is so cute! He laughed and smiled so much too, I love happy babies.

It’s been so relaxing to spend some time away from my regular routine working. I did a little bit of work this morning but it was so fun to just hang out and chill for the day. We went for a lovely walk in the forest too. The air is so fresh here, I forget that when living in the city. I’m looking forward to meditating and then falling asleep early(ish) tonight.

Moral of the story: take time out to relax. This is being hammered into my head more and more these days!