Part Two: The power your pen!

“Redeemable Rewards”

I am sure many of you have desired to redeem reward points from a credit card, frequent flyer miles or for your morning latte.  As good as these programs are you are prescribed to follow the rules of these organizations to redeem your reward points.

I have found in working with my clients, talking to friends and thinking about my own life the only way we actually achieve our goals is when we see the REDEEMABLE REWARD.  It is when we believe the reward(s) are tangible and obtainable we swing from where we currently are at to creating the future we desire in motion. It is in this moment we get to create our own reward program for our lives.  This moment I call a shift. 

A shift or movement from what we believe is possible into our NEW NOW which creates a space to put our redeemable rewards plan into action! This shift starts with the courage to have something different and in my experience when the something different is important enough to us we will choose to go after it.

Start today, by simply saying out loud what your redeemable rewards life is and start living in it. Your words will provide the direction to live in your "new now" today, instead of someday.  The someday is today!

Possibility presents itself to us in every moment in life through people, problems and places. 

Part One-Power of YOUR Pen!

“Put it in writing and we have a deal!”

I am sure most of us at some time in our lives have spoken the words “put it writing and we have a deal?”  We sign agreements for so many things from cars, to credit card applications, buying a new home; student loans insert your last written agreement.  The written agreement(s) we have entered into are not lock solid guarantees but one thing is for sure a written agreement spells out the specific terms like: the time frame, what you will receive upon signing the agreement and of course what it’s going to cost you.  I would add signing these agreements quite often are not the most exciting moments in life unless it is buying your first car, first home…things we really desire.

“What is important is what’s important to you!”

So this got me thinking “what if we wrote out written agreements with ourselves?”

Just like the agreement(s) I referred to in the paragraph above there is no guarantee and it is going to cost you something.  Although, something is significantly different in writing our own agreement(s) with ourselves and that is we are not limited to somebody else’s terms.  We actually have the freedom to write out what we really desire to have in life minus the stipulations created by somebody else in the agreements written by someone else.

Each of us has different passions and desires important to us.  Some of us aspire to write a book, have a clean house, get married, graduate from college, make a million dollars, balance the check book, create the next social marketing tool or just get out of bed in the morning.  What is important is what’s important to you. 

Possibility presents itself to us in every moment in life through people, problems and places.

The Window

Circle the Wagons-Rituals and Ruts

Each month I make the trek to the window and if you were to video tape my journey to the window it would not look that different from month to month.  In fact if you looked closely at the floor between the doors to the Veterans Medical Center to where I take my number and ultimately end up at the window for my prescriptions I think you could spot my footprints.  And because I love to live in fantasy……...if I was travelling by covered wagon on my monthly trips you would see the wagon wheel imprints from my home, leading to the window and back home again.  Through time the wagon wheels would have created a safe road to travel…….In reality what this type of journey has created is a ritualistic rut of certainty.  By taking the same path, the wagon wheels have created a rut which allows me to see the same old scenery. 

Yes, we have our daily routines of going to the pharmacy, getting the kids off to school, arriving to work on time, brushing our teeth and all the time I am wondering if there is some rule we have made up that we must be as efficient as possible, so we can move on to the next ritual.  Before you know it, we have gone through the motions of our day and it is time to do it all over again. 

Hurry Up and Wait

Now, there was certain process to follow at the window and I worked to learn the mechanics in order for my monthly visits to be an efficient quick process.  Each time I thought I had the process down to a science I was reminded of the old military saying “hurry up and wait”

In years past whenever I heard the phrase “hurry up and wait” I often times would get upset thinking this is ridiculous I could be doing something better with my time.  I now realize how ridiculously arrogant it is to think it is “my time”. It took a pioneer for me to realize my arrogance. 

One Armed Pioneer of Possibility

Recently, I was graced by having my ruts washed away and having a once monthly routine to “the window” become much more than just going through the motions.  It started out just like any other visit and this time I had hit the jackpot my prescriptions were done before I arrived.  I opened up my bag as I always do to ensure both prescriptions were in there before I left the building.  AND you guessed it one of my prescriptions was not in my bag so I took my number, took a seat and then in a moment the phrase “hurry up and wait” transformed into a whole new dynamic meaning.

In my seat, I observed a man and his wife in their eighties or nineties picking up his prescriptions.  I watched the two pioneers approach the window with a bit of slower pace : )  As the man retrieved his prescriptions his wife put her hand on her husband’s back so he would not fall over.  I heard her say to her husband “would you like me to hold your hand” and it was clear the man was not able to hold the prescriptions firmly so in a moment his wife gracefully carried the prescriptions for her husband instead.  From where I was sitting I could not see them both fully and as they walked away I saw the wife had one arm. 

The moment was quickly interrupted when a man approached the window demanding to know who much longer he would have to wait for his prescriptions and that he was too old for this #$%!  This man was also provision of possibility for me.  For I vary easily could have been that man and often times in my life have been that man AND today the words of Marcel Proust ring in my head as I recall my recent journey to the window: “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” 

Possibility presents itself to us in every moment in life through people, problems and places.