How to get what you want...My Way!

I know just as well as anyone that things are NOT delivered on silver platters, nor do they fall from the sky, nor do the checks just start showing up in the mailbox. If only. I personally believe that the harder you work, the luckier you get and that doesn’t always come overnight. So here’s the philosophy of how to get what you want according to Salina.


Step 1 is to determine what you value most in your life.

Step 2 is to evaluate your current life. Think about each item you say you value and ask yourself if you are actively living in harmony with your values. What do you DO that demonstrates each and every one of those values? Celebrate your successes and note your shortcomings.

Step 3 is to dream about what you want. I’m not talking about falling asleep and paying attention to what happens in your head (although that can sometimes be very powerful too). I’m talking about day dreaming, or in my case, swim dreaming. When you think of what you want most, what do you feel? Why are you feeling it? Is it happy, excited, nervous, stress, anger, sadness? Focus on the thoughts and dreams that make you feel like you sparkle on the inside. Those are the winners. Think about how amazing you will feel when you get to celebrate one of those huge moments of pride in your life. Think about explaining to someone how you got to where you did and being overjoyed with the outcome. Practice saying “it’s better than I ever dreamed it would be”. Think about the peace you will feel that night when you lay your head on your pillow to fall asleep, realizing that you have made all your dreams come true.

Step 4 is to take that list of shortcomings I mentioned in step 2 and turn that frown upside down. Those shortcomings are nothing but hoops to jump through to get what you want. So line up the hoops and get ready to start jumping. Make a plan first though. What can you do to turn one weakness into a strength? Is there a class you can take? Friends you need to talk to? Books you need to read? Family members you need to reach out to? Do the same exercise for the items on your “I WANT” list. What can you do to start actively working toward creating the life you want to be living?

 

Step 5 is where the rubber meets the road. Time to start taking action. Now is when we get to look at the fruits of our soul searching labor and realize that analysis paralysis never got anyone anywhere. Ready....set....go.

 

I Value

• Health/Fitness
• Freedom
• Friends
• Honesty/Integrity
• Adventure
• Tranquility
• Education

I Want

• To continue to lose weight and tone my muscles until I reach around 15% body fat (what ever number my body looks and feels the healthiest is where I’ll be).
• To maintain that body forever (or as long as mother nature will allow me to and as long as I am healthy and happy).
• To advance my career and take the next step. CFO of a startup maybe?
• To make six figures. $100,000 annual income at least.
• To sell my house and pay off all debt.
• To move to a city. I don’t mean a place that is considered a city because of the population density compared to the surrounding areas. I mean a real city. A thriving metropolis with all the beauty and wonderment that a city is. Complete with high end retailers and the homeless dudes that enjoy pissing on the front door.
• A condo in a high rise or an artsy loft somewhere obscure and fun.
• To write a book or 3 or 7
• To get at least one of those books published
• To speak Spanish and Mandarin fluently
• To play my guitar like it’s meant to be played (beautifully)
• To continue to build the wonderful friendships I currently have and find new ones too.
• To skate like a rockstar so I can play derby competitively
• To play golf more and win a real women’s amateur tournament
• To travel more. At least 1 international trip every year.
• A car that I enjoy driving
• To watch my Living Active blog readership explode overnight
• All of the items in this list (except the maintain weight forever one) to start to happen immediately

  

That’s nice and all but what am I going to DO about it?

• Health/Fitness: Stay the course I’m on. Living Active blog activities, keep talking to my Accountabilibuddy, keep journaling, drink my water, take my vitamins, get good sleep, etc.
• Eat healthy foods - I have a new and exciting thing planned for this TODO item in particular. Stay tuned and I will announce my plans soon. I’m excited.
• Freedom: Talk to friends, coworkers, family about any career opportunities they may know about. Find myself a headhunter. Start writing one of those books. Finish up all the little things around my house so it’s just perfect.
• Friends: Let the soul suckers go suck someone else of their will to live. Continue to invest in the quality people in my life. Remain open to new opportunities and people I’m introduced to (in other words: less judgemental please).
• Honesty/Integrity: I’m always Always ALWAYS honest. Sometimes, maybe too much so. Perhaps I can try to be a little nicer sometimes.
• Adventure: Skate. Skate. And skate some more. Plan my next international trip. Hmmmm...where shall I go? South Africa. India. Russia. South America. New Zealand.
• Tranquility: Meditate more? Perhaps meditate at all is more appropriate. Don’t forget to stop and smell the flowers. Keep reading. Read all the books I have on my shelves at home that haven’t been properly consumed yet, then a full on raid in the best used book store in all of Washington (Serendipity on San Juan Island) yet again.
• Education: Sign up for one of those language courses, finally. Should I hit the Spanish first since it’ll be a refresher before diving in to more advanced lessons where Mandarin is starting from scratch? I can start using the Rosetta Stone I already have. It’s Spanish. Practice my guitar again. I’m going to have to face my guitar fear of not being good enough and just do the damn thing.

 

First thing first! I think I’m starting with drink more water, yoga, read, then sleep.

 

Tomorrow I’ll figure out a plan of attack.

 

 Care to share your values? How about your dreams? Plans?

 

All Clogged Up

I'm not slacking, I promise. I don't know, I guess I'm just having writer's block or something? Every time I open my dashboard, I just end up staring at it before I close it with nothing clever or helpful to say. I'm sure there's good stuff in there but I'm just having trouble pulling it out, of my head I mean. Maybe I just need to snake the drain.

You know how sometimes you feel like everything is going along all dandy like? Not a care in the world? Just ho-hum? No biggie? Life is just life? Nothing dramatic or special or terrific or dreadful? I'm not feeling that. I mean, things are kinda pluggin' along but I'm feeling all clogged up. Like I've got some intense feelings that are just under the surface. Like it's the calm before the storm. Like something is about to happen. I can smell the rain in the air before a drop presents itself. I'm like a pet that freaks out and hides under the bed hours before an earthquake hits. Something spectacular is coming. I don't know if it's spectacularly wonderful or spectacularly horrid but it's spectacular and it's on its way.

Good things are happening!

I had a wonderful weekend. We made gingerbread houses and opened a couple Christmas presents. My lovely friend T got me the world's best hat you could ever imagine. When I opened it, I was so surprised by what I found inside that I think I may have froze for a second or something. It was such a thoughtful and personal gift. I just wasn't expecting something so, so, so, amazing. I'm just not use to that. It's wonderful. And I truly feel blessed by her friendship. She's one of those people that you can see yourself being friends with in your 90s after all the husbands have passed away and it's just the girls left behind.

The Hubby and I are getting along famously. Well, we do snap at each other periodically but we're dealing with it. We're enjoying each other's company. We're getting along. We're having fun. We're talking. We're doing great.

I'm losing weight. What's not to love about that? I mean really? My clothes are getting baggy on me which is fantastic and frustrating all at the same time.

Families are severely frustrating. That's a not so good thing that's happening. But when in life does that not happen? *insert eye roll here*

I had a really disturbing dream last night. Would you like to hear about it? I just don't know what to make of it.

I dreamt that I was being zapped by some invisible vibration. Have you ever used a sonicare toothbrush and bumped the head on your tooth by accident? How you feel the buzzing through your entire body and all you can hear is that buzzing on your tooth echoing through every nook and cranny from the top of your head down to the spaces between your toes? It felt like that. Something invisible was next to my bed (in my dream) and zapping me with this horrible vibration. It was deafening. In my dream, I half woke up and was grabbing for the invisible something to push it away and make it stop but it just kept hitting me with the vibration harder and harder. In my dream, my husband woke up by my struggling and trying unsuccessfully to call for his help. He reached over and touched me and the vibration stopped. So I clung to him for his help. The invisible something was still there taunting me with the threats of zapping me again and I reached out to swipe it away a few more times. Then I fell back asleep. This all happened while I was still asleep.

Then I woke up this morning and he and I compared dreams. He had horrible dreams too. Not the same kind as mine but he struggled through his sleep last night. I wasn't sure what was a dream and what was real from my night's sleep so I asked him if I said or did anything last night. He said I was shaking and wimpering in my sleep so he asked me if I was okay. I sat straight up in bed and mumbled that I was half asleep and didn't know what I was doing. Then I laid back down and went to sleep.

What do you make of this insanity?