What is your pace?
What is your pace at work, and is it working for you?
When you reflect on how you move through your day, at work, at what pace are you operating at?
Do you move at the slow and steady pace, moving through items to be done, one step at a time in a highly organised fashion and with a level of stability that ensures, in your own time, you get the job done, while below the surface you feel under immense pressure because other people want you to move faster, against your natural pace?
Perhaps you have a tendency to race through your day, pumped with adrenalin that gives you the rush you love, a power of influence and infectious energy that lifts everyone you meet, that is, except you, when you crash at the end of the day, not able to enjoy your home and family life?
You may operate within a chaotic whirlwind of reactivity to everything coming your way, constantly feeling the urgency of just about everything, leading you to rush to get things done, in your mind, to ease the urgency and calm the adrenalin spikes, but you never actually get to inner calm?
You may enjoy jumping from one idea to the next, thriving on ideas and possibilities, while deadlines and details pass you by, forming a sense of inner dis-ease and challenging your self-esteem.
Perhaps you are a visionary; you have your eye on a meaningful distant goal and you pace yourself for the long-game, setting strategic objectives and taking pro-active steps to meet each one, upholding firm boundaries to anything that may steer you from the dream? You have no problem saying ‘no’ to people and tasks, because you are firmly saying ‘yes’ to what matters most, but along the way, relationships fail to flourish or the tasks of daily life pile high that may well frustrate you or others!
Perhaps you function with a yogic balance; you arise to the sound of windchimes, take a green-tea and a meditative moment before you begin your day; you read your daily goals, you grace through your morning tasks and take a mindful break before engaging in interactive meetings with mindful notetaking. You pause for lunch, noticing the taste sensations in each mouthful, followed by a gentle stroll as you prepare to deeply focus on an important task, placing a boundary around all distractions. You bring your work day to a close with reflective time, setting and adjusting the agenda for the days and weeks ahead so that you can maintain your balance and enjoy your home and family life
Everyone is different and I am not suggesting a right or wrong way of being, there is a pace suited to varied roles, rather I am inviting you into a moment of reflection for the purpose of identifying whether how you are being is working for you, and, if it aligns with your deeper truth about who you are, what you want and how you want to experience your life?
Why we are the way we are
In a nutshell, the combined forces of innate beingness and conditioning: some are born to walk, others to run, while there are those who are destined to sing, dance or fly through their days. As the years of our lives unfold, the ways of world tend to shape our emerging and becoming, instilling innate driving forces that cause us to act and react as we do, due to a foundation of deep seated negative beliefs that instruct us to ‘do better’, ‘be perfect’, ‘move faster’, ‘be good enough’, or ‘be right’, driving forces that fire a need for achievement, advancement, acceptance, and pride while internally fuelling a sense of unrest, anxiety and stress, or, for the lucky ones, positive influencing forces steer the currents, inviting a rhythm of calm confidence, steadiness, restful focus, peaceful practice, liberated expression, happiness, joy, balance and harmony that simply helps make life better.
How do you want to be?
While answering this question may seem obvious to you, there is a chance that your answer is a conditioned answer about how you think you want to be, and not the truth of your deep inner self?
I recall when a part of me would answer in the name of peace and harmony, only to recognise a deeper truth; that actually I believed that peace would be quite boring. Dive a little deeper, and the truth is that I did not have any idea of what a state of inner peace and harmony felt like, so it was an abstract concept at best; I thought I wanted something I knew nothing about! Move forward a decade, and from a place of knowing true peace, I can truthfully state that I choose to operate in peace and harmony, because I know this feeling and this power, there is not sense of boredom here, indeed in peace and harmony, there is a clear sense of meaningful purpose aligned with the values of my heart and an inner power that unleashes abundant forces of creation, focus and drive. Now I know that I do not need or indeed want surges of adrenalin to energise my day, because they steal my peace, limit my focus, and disconnect me from holding the focus on important long-term beautiful goals. My peace is my power for generating success where it matters and harmony is grace I aspire to.
How do you make the change?
In a nutshell, with love and faith. When you love yourself, you believe in yourself, your possibility and potential, you own your truth, uphold your value, command respect and choose faith over fear, because it’s the kind choice to self, and it is the choice that fundamentally drives success where you most want it.
Learning to grow love and faith arms you with the power to hold up a psychic shield to pressure, to make caring choices to ease your pace, to choose joy over adrenalin highs, and the realisation of deep fulfilment over quick wins, to grow from reactive living and into mindful presence, breathing, owning your strengths, and possessing the courage to move to new pastures if they are not valued where you are, and to moving into a deeper sense of presence and connection that helps you balance your visionary dreams with the tasks of daily life, because you faith, truly, that the dream is unfolding, and patience is truly all that is required to ease the balance of your life and help bring about a new harmony.
Where are you at, where do you want to be, what belief is holding you back and what belief and combined action could help you break free and move into a pace of being that is simply better for you?
