15 Minutes to Freedom

No Limits | The Freedom Blog™

15 Minutes to Freedom

Written by Steven Griggs | stevengriggs.com

“If you can’t leave for the airport in 15 minutes, you’re not free”

Stuart Wilde

My mother has recently become a bit of a sensation on Youtube (more about that later).

I was looking at her most recent video when I happened upon a short one minute video by Stuart Wilde.

I’ve read most of Stuart’s books and I spent a couple of weeks with him back in 1999 cruising around southern England and Ireland. That was an amazing trip.

I consider Stuie an important teacher of mine. He has helped me immensely.

In the video he was talking about how most people are trapped in an unseen prison, a matrix and that if you can’t leave for the airport in 15 minutes, you’re not free.

He is referring to the prison in which a person lives a life that consists of a continual and never ending feeding.  A life within which we are so shut down and blinded that we never see what is really going on.

We are lost in a zombie like trance, feeding the hunger of a never ending quest for bigger and better homes, cars, and things.

It’s not our fault. We’re born into it, into the tribal emotion of our people. But our culture is changing and its people have become less and less self-reliant and more dependent.

We are beginning to have a mindset of entitlement and a willingness to accept more control. We exchange our freedom for the comfort of our prisons…..

But what Stuart is really saying is: can you just get up and go? I mean drop everything and go?

Not too many of us could.

But I think there are degrees of freedom.

By freedom I really mean self-determination, having no one to answer to. Living how you wish, where you wish, going where ever you want, whenever you want, just living life on your own terms. Being free.

Generally, living this type of lifestyle requires three things:  that you have adequate funds, be self-employed and have a low overhead.

Meeting these requirements is not possible for most people.

Therefore I feel that, although Stuart’s 15 minute idea is the ultimate goal, below that there are other levels of freedom.

For instance, could you leave for the airport with a 24 hour notice?

Or would you need a week’s notice or maybe a 6 month notice?

Or would you not need any notice at all as you couldn’t really even go to the airport……?

The idea here is to look at your life and see it in the context of being trapped. I’m not saying trapped in the negative sense where it is painful or uncomfortable, because this prison is not uncomfortable. It is extremely comfortable. Secure, consistent and….. hypnotizing.

The freedom I refer to is so free that it would be really scary for most people…..

They wouldn’t know what to do.

But how would it feel to not have a boss to answer to? To not have to stay on the money treadmill to just make the payments on your “life”?

How about not having to spend 10 hours a day just earning enough money to make your payments, so you can spend 2 hours a day driving the car you don’t own, to the job you dislike, to make the payments on the house you don’t own, so you can eat, watch a little TV and go to bed…. and then get up and do it exactly the same way the next day…..?

Forgive me if I seem excited…..I get a little passionate about this subject.

What can you do to move towards more freedom and away from control and restriction? Restriction that comes from the financial needs you have obligated yourself to, that you’ve collateralized your life to?

What steps can you take to throw off the weight of things and make room for more freedom?

The way I see it is that we are all on our own individual journey. Sometimes being hypnotized and on the treadmill is what we need to experience in this lifetime.

But if you’re like me, I don’t do treadmills and I can’t stand restriction.

I’m working towards the 15 minutes notice.

www.stevengriggs.com

Are You a Finisher or a Fumbler?

No Limits | The Freedom Blog™

Are You a Finisher or a Fumbler?

Written by Steven Griggs | stevengriggs.com

“Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task”

William James

“The way to be nothing is to do nothing”

Nathaniel Howe

“Little strokes fell great oaks”

Benjamin Franklin

There are basically two types of goals: short term and long term. Short term can mean anything from days to weeks to months. And long term could mean 5 months, 5 years or even decades.

The longer out into the future the goal is, the more danger there is in losing sight of the goal or changing or modifying your commitment to it. It may begin to seem unattainable or unrealistic.

This may be because entrepreneurs, being action oriented and optimistic, tend to underestimate the time and energy it will take to complete the necessary steps to reach the goal.  We start to run out of energy before we accomplish the goal.

That's because we are usually very impatient. We don’t like having to go slowly or do it in small steps. We want it done now.

One solution is to convert your long term goal into short term steps or sub-goals.

While not losing sight of the main goal, it is crucial that the goal be broken down into bite size pieces or sub-goals that can be accomplished on a daily or weekly basis.

Smaller steps are easier to accomplish and allow you to feel rewarded when you complete each step. This in turn reinforces and encourages you to complete the next step. You actually see progress.

You can make the process easier by writing the steps down and being SMART.

SMART stands for:

Specific- Define the step clearly.

Measurable- Can you know when the step is completed?

Attainable- The step is not out of reach, it is doable.

Realistic- It must be a step you actually want to do.

Timely- Setup a time frame for completion.

I recommend keeping two separate “to do” lists. Have your long term goals written down on one list and the steps you are going to take to accomplish each goal on your daily "to do" list.

Look at the daily “to do” list and make sure you accomplish at least one of the steps needed to complete that goal each day.

Avoid keeping long “to do” lists.

Long lists become too overwhelming and burdensome. You will begin to feel like the list is not accomplishable. Another tendency is to treat your long “to do” list as a wish list of things you think you should accomplish in the future. 

This can be really destructive and counterproductive. It will sap your energy just thinking about how much you have to do…. 

So keep your daily “to do” list short.

Not completing your projects or tasks creates weight and brings you down. The uncompleted goal is always looming over you and begins to drain your energy, desire and creativity.

So create your goals. Break them down into sub-goals. Create action steps you can take each day to meet your sub-goals. Complete your steps and sub-goals. Reach your targeted goal.

Wash, Rinse, Repeat.

Remember, you can accomplish anything you truly decide to do.

Don’t be a fumbler, become a finisher.

www.stevengriggs.com

Are You Living or Dying?

No Limits | The Freedom Blog™

Are You Living or Dying?

Written by Steven Griggs | stevengriggs.com

“I’d rather die living than die dying” Steven Appleton, Chairman of Micron Technology

Two weeks ago on a Friday, Steven Appleton, the chief executive and chairman of Micron Technology, Inc. died when his acrobatic plane crashed at the Boise airport.

In addition to running the last remaining U.S. competitor in the DRAM or memory business, Steven was a stunt pilot, race car driver and was involved in a lot of other high speed, high risk, high adrenaline activities, including martial arts.

Obviously he was a very active and fast moving guy. And he surely lived his passions.

"I'm obviously an aggressive person," Mr. Appleton told The Wall Street Journal in 2006. "It is kind of a cliché, but I'd rather die living than die dying."

This really struck me because it was such a clear example of how to live a life, to really live as fully as possible in every moment.  

Even though he died at a fairly young age, Steve probably lived two lifetimes of intense passion filled moments compared to most people.

Not many of us are aerial acrobats or race car drivers like Steven Appleton, but like him, we all have passions.

So the question is: What are you doing today (and tomorrow) to feed your passion?

Working in your business 12-14 hours a day may satisfy you and you may say it feeds your passion. And if that is really true, more power to you.

But is it true? Does it really take 12-14 hours a day to build and then run a successful business? 

I don’t think so.

To test yourself, try using the death bed scenario. Picture yourself dying and in your final moments when you are looking back on your life.

Are you going to be happy that you spent all that time away from your spouse or children, working?

Are you going to be glad that you never seemed to take those trips you planned on?

Are you going to be glad you never pursued that painting class or started writing the book you always talked about writing?

So, the question is: Are you living or dying?

www.stevengriggs.com

How's Your Internal Dialogue?

No Limits | The Freedom Blog

How’s Your Internal Dialogue?

Written by Steven Griggs | stevengriggs.com

"The internal dialogue is what grounds people in the daily world. The world is such and such and so and so, only because we talk to ourselves about it being such and such and so and so. The passageway into the world of the shamans opens up after the warrior has learned to shut off his internal dialogue" Carlos Castaneda

How is your self-talk?

Are you aware of how you talk to yourself?

Are you even aware that you “talk” to yourself?

We all do it. For many of us the voice speaks very quietly and we almost don’t hear it, but it’s there.

We talk to ourselves constantly. We are on an endless loop of questions, commentaries, replays and reruns.

We play back conversations and think of things we should or shouldn’t have said.

We replay scenarios of what we should or shouldn’t have done.

We relive old battles and arguments. We have imaginary conversations with our bosses or our spouse or children.

It never ends.

But in one way we are stuck and can’t get away from it. This is because we think in terms of language. We don’t just see images of the scene in our mind, we also translate it into words.

So there we are.

But there are ways to change this, to dial it down and alter the conversation.

The first step in learning to modify or adjust your self-talk is to begin paying attention to what you are saying…. especially about yourself.

Watch how you treat yourself and the things you say. (Isn’t this all a bit weird? Your mind listening to your mind talking to itself about itself…..!)

Keep track of how often you say something negative or critical about yourself, or your ability, or your looks, your body…. you get what I mean.

That’s the beginning.

Later you can begin changing your mind’s thought patterns through meditation. The goal in meditation (it really shouldn’t be called a goal) is to quiet the mind so you fall in between the gaps, the gaps between your thoughts.

It takes a little bit of technique and a little practice but meditating will have a profound effect on your mind and body. I will go into it more in a later article.

So start tuning in to what you are saying about yourself. Become aware of how you actually feel about yourself.

You can change the recording just like changing a CD.

You just have to listen.

www.stevengriggs.com

Wishing And Hoping

No Limits | The Freedom Coach

Wishing and Hoping

Written by Steven Griggs | thefreedomcoach.com

“If you have a goal, write it down. If you do not write it down, you do not have a goal - you have a wish.”                                                                               
Steve Maraboli                                                            

 

To be a warrior is not a simple matter of wishing to be one. It is rather an endless struggle that will go on to the last minute of our lives. Nobody is born a warrior, in exactly the same way no man is born an average man. We make ourselves into one or the other”                                                                                           Carlos Castaneda

According to the Free Dictionary, the definition of a wish is: A desire, longing, or strong inclination for a specific thing….something desired or longed for.

Hope is defined as:  A wish or desire accompanied by confident expectation of its fulfillment.

The main difference is that wishing for something is not really connected to an expectation of it really happening. A wish is disconnected from reality.

Hoping for something implies that there is some reasonable expectation that it could or will happen.

While hoping is better than wishing, neither of them actually set in motion the mechanism wherein you create the thing or outcome you desire.

It’s like dreaming of winning the lottery but you never a buy a ticket!

The missing ingredient is action. Without action every idea, desire, wish or hope will remain unrealized.

On the flip side, continually dwelling in the realm of wishing and hoping can actually create problems. When your hopes and wishes are not immediately forthcoming, frustration and anger rise up to take the place of optimism.

This will lead to resistance and may actually push the things or outcomes you desire away.

A little bit of wishing is probably normal, those fleeting thoughts we all have that flash through our minds. All of us day dream and run scenarios about things we wish or hope for.

I think in situations where your current circumstances may be a bit grim or are actually really bad, it would be understandable to drift off into daydreams of a better future.

Don’t let that happen.

Yes, you need to dream and have hope, but I think the trick would be to keep the dream and hopes visible on the horizon. In other words, visualize a goal that is short term, feasible and reachable.

By having the goal based on something real and achievable, the closer you get, the more reachable that goal becomes. This in turn makes the next step easier.

Every step you take reinforces the next step and all the steps add up to real progress.

By getting clear on the dream/hope/wish, being proactive by taking action, by working your plan in some way every day, you will inevitably reach the goal.

The nature of plans is that they change and as you progress yours may change too.

By being in the action phase of creating, other opportunities will open up to you. You will start to have options.

There is nothing like having options! It is so much better than the alternative.

So watch the wishing, keep the hoping focused on what’s attainable..... .

And dream on……

www.thefreedomcoach.com