Motivation

I saw a great youtube video on how to heal cancer and it prompted me to revisit an age old wisdom about motivation.

Basically, unhealthy living and eating is a slow poison which more often than not doesn't end well. I doubt that anyone lives to die, and in fact to die a slow and painful death. But not everyone is wise enough to foresee cause and effect.

There are two things that motivate us:
1) to gain pleasure, and
2) to avoid pain.

We tend to favour the second point more. Therefore choose to avoid pain over gaining pleasure. The problem is that not everyone can see that with slow processes what seems pleasurable today may contribute to pain on the long run.

Marketing's new role in the digital age

As marketing becomes more and more measurable and zeros in on ROI, retargeting (driving increased sales) is an excellent (as well as measurable and transparent) platform, among others, to demonstrate how marketing is not only about glossy images of brand building, but in fact about wealth creation for an organisation.

You can do anything, but you can't do everything

A month without a post. There is always a reason. I learned a new skill that I've been wanting to learn for circa 25 years. I'm delighted to report that I've been knitting almost every evening in July.

First it took half an hour for a row of fifty stitches, now it takes less than 3 minutes (always the achiever). The initial enthusiasm will certainly settle into something less obsessive soon, but it's years worth of hunger that needs satisfying first.

You can do anything. Almost anything. But something has got to give.

It's winter in Sydney. Blog parked for a little while, knitting is on.

Life's challenges

Everybody has challenges in life; at work, at home and everywhere in between. By solving problems, we get stronger and wiser.

But there are people who when presented with issues, completely change direction and choose not to face them. Those refusing to do so, or expect others to solve these for them, don't learn but stagnate. And they find they face the same problems over and over again and perhaps even make the same mistakes again.

It's of course not quite this black & white. Some situations are easier to solve than others, but if you can celebrate the fact that there is always something to learn, challenges will become your friends.

A little bit of kindness - goes a long way

Came to the doctor's this morning with flu symptoms. Fever, body ache, lethargy - you know the rest.

It's a busy surgery, with 8-10 docs and I'm only a semi-regular; if there is such.

This morning I got a smile and was greeted with my own name. As miserable as I felt I couldn't help but return the smile and it stuck with me for moments afterwards. Suddenly I felt a lot better.

Such a small thing, calling people their name and letting off a smile, yet it goes such a long way.