I remember standing next to the diving block, staring down at the strong smelly pool water, and being scared out of my mind.
There was no way I was going to jump in.
I could see some of my school friends taking the leap next to me, but they were so much taller that me. (I’m only 5 feet tall now, imagine how small I was when I was 7 years old.) They were more experienced, had stronger arms…and besides I couldn’t stand getting water up my nose either.
I remember stepping up onto the block and the teacher cajoling me from the side of the pool. “Jump!” he cried out.
And then a thought occurred to me.
Ok, I’ll jump. But I’ll jump as close to the edge as I can, so I can hold on to the side of the pool. That way there’s no way that I’ll drown.
I closed my eyes and threw my tiny body off the diving block, aiming for the edge…
Next thing I knew I was being pulled from the water, a mouth filled with blood, while one of my precious little teeth floated away to the bottom of the pool.
That day I learnt some valuable lessons about leaping into the unknown.
- Lesson #1 : Expecting something dreadful to happen, usually makes it pretty damn certain that something dreadful is going to happen.
- Lesson #2: Forget your excuses – you don’t need to know how to swim to be free to jump. Just get the hang of floating first.
- Lesson #3: Ironically it’s safer to jump where the water is deepest.
- Lesson #3: Don’t half leap into something, thinking you have a back up plan when things go wrong. If you’re going to jump, just bloody well do it.
- Lesson #4: Have faith – because even if you have nothing to put under your pillow, the Tooth Fairy still rocks up. Awesome.
So tell me, what’s stopping you from jumping in at the deep end?
If you have ever tried learning a new skill, then you will know how it feels to be a clumsy and embarrassed beginner.
You totter and stumble, like a baby learning to walk for the first time. But thankfully, in those early days when you tried to take your first steps, no-one ever said to you, “You know, maybe you should just give up on the whole walking thing. I mean, you keep falling over, and you’ve been trying for months now and you still can’t put one foot in front of the other. Why don’t you just stick to crawling, you’re great at that!” Instead you were given abundant permission to fail because there is a knowing that everyone gets there, eventually.
But as adults, we are much more likely to withhold this permission to fail from ourselves. It’s too easy to give up if we don’t immediately get it “right”. The gap between how we are performing and how we think or assume it ought to be done can seem a gap too wide and humiliating to conquer. We have our pride. We have bizarre ideas of what we are capable of and what we are just “no good at”. Our time is precious, and we expect so much of ourselves that sometimes it’s easier to just stay “specialized” and stick to what we know we can do, rather than waste our days on something new that only makes us feel like a failure.
But we often give up right when the prize is literally inches away from our grasp. continue reading…
Have you ever stopped to notice how often you complain about something?
Think back over the past 24 hours and try to remember the conversations you had, not just with other people, but with yourself.
What did you spend your time focusing on? The good stuff? Or the stuff that really made you mad, annoyed, sick, upset, depressed or pissed off?
We tend to get a lot of mileage out of being miserable. Why is this? Is it somehow more beautifully tragic? More attainable? A tasty way to get more attention? Or do we place so little trust in our own ability to deal with our negative experiences that we have to seek out the solutions (and sympathy) from other people?
Or maybe it’s just that we’ve learned, over time, that no-one wants to hear how great we’re doing. That would be bragging. Cocky. Just weird.
We can get the same effect by storing up all the crappy stuff in our head instead, like a proud and wounded ninja unwilling to burden those around us with our noble inner turmoil. But the effect is still the same, whether you share it with the world or keep it to an internal monologue.
It’s called focusing on the stuff we hate. And it only breeds more of said stuff to hate. Which makes you talk about it more, think about it, broadcast it to others, label it in neon lights as “true”…before you know it, there goes another funky little failure mantra over and over in your head like a bad song on a loop. continue reading…
I know you do it.
When you’re home on your own. When you’re certain you won’t be overheard or interrupted by someone walking in on you.
When you strip off all your clothes, draw the curtain (or close the glass door) and stand wet and naked in the steam…
It doesn’t take long before the urge strikes. And I should know, I’m guilty of indulging myself all the time. continue reading…
Have you ever watched “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” (If you haven’t seen it for a while, check out this episode featuring Robin Williams.) It’s a show that combines stand-up comedy with improvisation (and I do love it, yes I do.)
As a performer, I was trained to practice improvisation as the ultimate way of being creatively in the moment. When an improviser is on form and “in the flow”, the result is dynamic, adventurous, rebellious and unpredictable – but this entertaining craziness all hangs very carefully on a stable craft that makes us – as the audience – feel completely safe, despite the chaos on the surface. This is why “making it up as you go along” is actually a misleading description, because it’s not about marching in blind and simply winging it…
It’s about knowing the rules that work and then playing spontaneously within them.
Taking risks is so much easier when you know there is a safety net beneath you. It gives you the permission to have more fun being “in the moment”, and the courage to dance madly on the tightrope.
So if you want to be more playful and free, really engaged and wildly creative, why not try using the “psychology of improvisation” to help you? Here are 10 improv principles that will help to get you started: continue reading…
We’ve all passed a busker standing in the street, trying to be heard above the noise.
In London, you usually catch them playing in the tiled tunnels of the Underground. Tiles give a great acoustic, especially if you are a little rough around the edges, which let’s face it, most buskers are.
No doubt you’ve passed one who has caught your ear with something a little more tuneful than most. Something a little special about them that made you toss a coin or two in their direction.
Perhaps you even stopped to listen at a comfortable distance.
But – as far as gaining an audience goes – the Underground is not the kind of place where people tend to linger. After all, there are trains to miss, carriages to squish into, and fat rats to spy scurrying underneath the rails. (At least, this is what happens in London.)
But what if the busker was really, really good? I mean, seriously talented. Would a crowd begin to gather, travellers clinging to the tiles to listen to the sheer gorgeousness being played by the unlikely maestro?
Surely, with such talent, the trains could wait? continue reading…
If you read last week’s post about chickens, then you will know that the words we choose to describe ourselves can actually end up caging us in.
They are almost like spells. We can describe ourselves to everyone as “serious” and serious is how we behave. We can magically label ourselves as “broke” and funnily enough, not having enough money is what we experience. Depressed, uninspired, frustrated, tired, overworked, busy – it doesn’t matter if it’s real or not. It’s the spin you are putting on it.
It is within your power now to change your perspective on your situation. continue reading…
“I’d love to…but I just don’t have the time.” Sound familiar?
Are there things on your To Do list that always get left behind because you never have enough hours in the day? (Assuming you even have a To Do list!)
Or perhaps there’s a book you want to write? Or a subject you want to study? Maybe you’ve always wanted to learn an instrument, or play tennis, or go walking in the mornings, or start practising yoga and meditating…
But finding the time…impossible, right? continue reading…
