Give Peace a Chance

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1278 Relax and Succeed - Give peace a chanceA lot of my readers are from many different religions. The fact that I grew up in a predominantly Christian place means that my family has always defaulted to Christian holidays, although we happily added most of those others over time too. This means that, thanks to the approaching season and some important personal matters, I will not be writing for the blog again until January 1st of 2018, at which time I am contemplating a shift in its direction.

You’ve all been very kind with your notes of thanks, and your sharp eyes for typos and people attempting to plagiarize my work. You all respond well to positivity and while you experience negativity, you don’t dwell on it. Despite being scattered all over the world, you are all a part of a community of like-minded people who care; people who prioritize peace and love over status and power. I am happy to count myself among you.

It has been a pleasure sharing these lessons with you for another year, and I thank you for taking the time to read them. Without any expectation but lots of anticipation, I eagerly await 2018 and all of the many surprises it’s sure to bring.

All the best for whatever seasons you celebrate.

Warm regards, s

Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.

The Act of Active Love

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1277 Relax and Succeed - Appreciation was an actionMany people make beautiful connections with others, but too much proximity for too long can mean that we can slowly see those connections atrophy and harden into little more than terminology. Rather than listening to people, we only hear them. Rather than recognising people, we only see them. And rather than loving people actively, as a verb, we think about how we’re confident we love them without ever actually showing it. It’s not that we wouldn’t love them, it’s that we were too busy thinking to truly notice them.

Most people live like tomorrows are guaranteed long into the future when none of us truly knows if this is possibly our last week on Earth. We don’t have to sell everything and move to the beach in the assumption that it’s all meaningless, we can still live prepared for our tomorrows and still be fully awake and alive today.

Let’s look around our lives. What words do we use and is our life in actual alignment with those words or do we just know those things are true without any real evidence in daily life? And once we find those things (guaranteed, they’re there), will we care enough to act upon them? In the end, words are spoken thought. But thoughts turned into actions are what creation is made of.

I would strongly recommend watching this, because what I trust is your heart’s ability to interpret the undeniable beauty that lives inside each and every one of us.

Have a wonderful weekend loving everyone.

peace and love. s

Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.

A Life Well-Lived

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1276 Relax and Succeed - Authenticity the courage to be yourselfA lot of the reason that people feel like they may not be doing the right thing in life is because they have pre-constructed the concept of success in their imagination and what they imagine isn’t an action, it’s a definition or result. While a healthy person is merely fascinated by what they’re doing, someone lost and uncertain will be trying to raise their value, status or power in some way, shape or form.

Since the media is a nearly unavoidable force in the raising of a child it is important to see a child’s actions as not only being based on the child’s caregivers, but also on other significant forces like media trends, which lead to all sorts of unintended consequences, like the formations of things like cultures of irreverence, or of uptalkers for example.

One of the other unintended consequences of media as a learning force is that children automatically and unknowingly come to see success as being linked to popularity or fame, hence “be famous,” has only recently been added as an answer to the question, what do you want to do with your life? (People used to say astronaut, or doctor or deep sea diver.)

1276 Relax and Succeed - Study hard what interests you mostThe truth is, fame and fortune are not at all what makes a good life. Richard Feynman won a Nobel Prize almost because he was a famous iconoclast, too dedicated to his own curiosity to ever get anywhere had it not been for the fluke that his curiosity primarily landed in one field (while he was well respected in many). But if his passions had not been in physics right while physics was literally exploding (he worked on the atomic bomb), his life may have been much less notable. Likewise, most truly great lives are not noticeable to anyone but the people living them, and those closest to them.

I was recently at the funeral of my parent’s neighbour. I’ve known her since I was three. As I sat in the pew at the church listening to the speakers, I was struck by how much I admired the woman, and almost precisely because she was so different from me. Since being teased relentlessly as a kid I’ve ignored other people’s views in favour of a set of guiding principles so, I’ve always liked my life and how I live it, but that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate equally authentic lives that unfold in their own unique ways.

Whereas I am a quick thinking enthusiastic person who has generally held leadership positions and would be in that tiny group of people that takes action when others won’t, she was extremely gentle and appreciative; always a safe harbour for any and all troubled neighbourhood kids. I’ve travelled the world and had awesome jobs and worked in film and TV and made lots of money–my life looks like (or rather used to look like)–the kind of life people would want to have. Hers was much smaller, but it was equally a rich life and it was very well lived. I had fun in my other life, but I’m actually more like her now.

1276 Relax and Succeed - Don't change so people will like youJust as I had cared about the big exciting things I was doing, she was caring deeply about the smaller more intimate details of life. Where I might be inspiring or informative, she offered comfort and support. She earned the love of her family throughout her life. She was enthusiastic about her work while she was a worker, and as a homemaker she was one of those dream Moms who always has a warm smile and fresh homemade food. She was also a very dedicated and loving parent and stand-in parent to her own child and many others.

If someone asked me today; if you couldn’t live your life, which life would you live, I have generally answered I’m loving the life I have. But if you forced me to choose, a life entirely like hers seems, to me, as enjoyable and as profound as my own has been, and the change of pace would be educational I’m sure. What’s curious about this is that many of my students come to me wanting to be more like I was, and by the time we’re done they want to be more like themselves, which is often much more like my parent’s very successful neighbour with her very successful life.

She died wanting more. That can feel like it should be sad, but it’s really the opposite that’s sad; when they’ve gone past their desire for life the death feels more like a relief. But right up until the end she had a tomorrow to be excited about and, when she finally realised she wouldn’t get that, she became just as excited by what was next, smiling just before her death, uttering the words, “my parents…” It really doesn’t get more beautiful than that and I am glad such a wonderful woman got such a fitting end to a life very well lived.

Life is in the details. Don’t always look above you. Sometimes what you’re looking for is already around you, or even possibly something you previously left behind. But do not assume bigger is better. Better is whatever your nature leads you to. In that regard, may your life be as successful as hers.

peace. s

Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.

You Are An Alien

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1275 Relax and Succeed - MIB headRemember the aliens inside people’s heads in Men in Black? Well, without knowing it, you’re one of them–or rather very like them. I know this might come as a surprise but it’s actually good news. It explains your anguish as a human. You keep trying to figure out how to feel better, but until you realise you’re an alien all of the advice you get will be for naught.

You’re from the planet Bbking, so-named by a NASA scientist who discovered it and its people. She loved the blues and knew that, just as BB King couldn’t sing and play guitar at the same time, the aliens from that planet could either pull levers or talk, but they can’t do both at once.

In human terms, this is your true self versus your ego. The lever-pulling operator versus the alien sitting still and talking. The talking is just talking and does nothing–the levers run your life. But some aliens come to Earth and the air here makes them a bit squirrely. (Squirrels on Bbking are very similar to squirrels on Earth. They’re actually one of the more successful species in our galaxy, strangely enough.)

1275 Relax and Succeed - Quiet your mindWithout noticing it, aliens become slowly addicted to how the air encourages them to speak rather than move. They end up light-headed, babbling away to themselves to the point where their life doesn’t even happen. They go places and do things, but it’s all automated. They’re body will just mimic the bodies it was raised near unless the Bbkinger on board actually shuts up and grabs the levers and steers.

Today, keep in mind that this alien is you. Listen for that little voice. Blah blah blah. Nothing it says means anything because it’s not from here and doesn’t even know what’s going on. It’s all guesses. Look out the eyeballs, use the ears and other senses, and then grab the levers and steer.

Remember: talking is the alien drugging themselves with nothing useful. Life is pulling levers. Don’t try to act like other people, you can’t tell them from your fellow aliens. But once you know how to pull levers instead of talking inside your own head, your vision will improve and you’ll be able to tell who’s a head-talker and who’s pulling levers, and the latter group will likewise be able to recognise you.

Don’t talk to yourself like an average human, be yourself and be freed through your actions. Join the culture of health. We look forward to seeing you.

peace. s

PS BTW, if you want to know what your original name is on planet BBKing, it’s an unusual process, but you take the first district or region or area you live in for your first name, and your last is created by adding the name of the last drug you were prescribed.

Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.

Dedicated Awareness

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1274 Relax and Succeed - Threat your relationshipsA few years back some newlyweds moved in down the street. You know the type. They were the kind of couple that frustrates unloved people because they are so doting, so nose-to-nose, as they bob in a bubbly beaming kind of love.

They got themselves the cutest little puppy. He wasn’t too sure-footed, but he made up for a lack of direction in enthusiasm. Their morning walks past my house looked like their conversations sounded, zipping from over here to over there for no apparent reason, but every minute of travel was full of life as he tangled the two together with his leash. I saw this little tableau play out every single morning at 6:00am.

After they had lived there a couple of years, their walk had switched to match the dog’s. Now it was a bit after 6:00am when they went by, although that worked because they could move faster thanks to the dog walking in a straight line while they just held hands and talked. Sometimes you could tell one had an early morning or a late night, because one or the other of them would go by alone with the dog, which worked, because by then the dog was less trouble in that he was much more predictable by then.

1274 Relax and Succeed - Do not let a lack of awarenessWithin a couple years after that people saw them together far less often. Their appearances grew less youthful and more professional. They walked and talked more professionally too, even to each other. By now they were almost ignoring the dog the walk was so predictable.

By about seven years in, he’s usually walking the dog alone, and if it’s not him alone it’s her. Whoever it is is now on the phone more than they pay attention to the dog. As we age we get jobs that demand more, our days start often earlier. Even the dog was starting to walk more slowly by then.

Over the next few years you saw them together and apart, but even when they were together it definitely seemed like the warmth had worn off. They’d go by, bundled up in winter clothes, never holding hands, often on their phones in separate virtual locations. I’d see the dog run around in the field chasing the ball, but no one was watching it, and they only looked for the ball after the dog was waiting for another throw, no more pride in him just finding it all.

I found it a bit sad to watch, because it had always been a good and loyal dog. But now he was slowing down and his running days were numbered and he seemed more anxious than ever to access his inner puppy. Mostly his excitement just frustrated them as they worked to calm him down.

1274 Relax and Succeed - The best time to plant a treeEventually the owner was waiting for the dog as it limped along. It just sat in the field now and watched the other dogs run, wishing it still could too. And so it would sit there, alone in the cold, while whoever was walking him checked their work messages before dragging him back to the house.

Of course eventually the dog died, as did the relationship. In fact, the track of their walks is very similar to the journey most relationships take, from focus and appreciation to assumption and demands. With each slightly colder step, we remove the heat from the relationship and we create unnecessary distance between us and others. This only happens due a lack of consciousness that it is happening.

The dog died with puppy still in his heart. But that pup could not play without someone to play with. So too went the relationship. The puppy; the loving, caring, bumbling, mistake-ridden, totally forgiven for crapping on the carpet puppy, was always present. All he needed was two partners who were prepared to stay connected and to notice he was there, as playful as ever. If we can all learn to do that one thing, we can all learn to keep our dogs for as long as we live.

peace. s

Scott McPherson is an Edmonton-based writer, public speaker, and mindfulness facilitator who works with individuals, companies and non-profit organizations locally and around the world.