Business Breakfasts - Working on Business Solutions

Relish are really pleased to have been asked to work in partnership with the new breakfast business meeting alton4business in Alton.

The first event "Working on your Business, not in it - the Challenges of the Small Business" was a great success.

Nearly 20 people turned up and there was quite a buzz in the room. Once breakfast was over, the group was divided into small teams and were given some questions to answer and discuss, in particular what they could do to work more on their business.

Feedback so far has been very positive including "it really made me think", "it was very informative" and "I think you are on to a real winner with meetings like this and I will be recommending businesses to start to come along!"

The next one I will be hosting will be 24th October and will be on Business Planning for 2008! These events are a great way of supporting other businesses, whilst raising our profile in the business world.

Pause for Thought

For me, one of the great things about running events like this is that you always learn something new. I find no matter how many times you run an event, something new will always present itself!

So I am looking forward to the next event ...with Relish!

Life's Lessons - How a broken foot helped me to ask for help!

At the beginning of May, I had the calamity of falling off my flip flop, whilst washing the car and broke my foot! (The fifth metatarsal to be exact!)

Cleaning the car is clearly a dangerous sport and from now on I will get a big strong man to do it for me!!

Actually, I should point out at this stage, that whilst I slipped off my flip flop, which in itself, I am unabashed about, it was the second part of the manouvre that finally did the damage - falling down an embankment and rolling over on the foot! Me being me, I thought what a muppet, and assumed I had just badly bruised/sprained it, and pretended like nothing much had happened – typical me. I am not good with illness or injury. Just ask my family! My poor ex-husband was nearly at death’s door, when I made him walk into A & E, with pernicious anaema, that had him barely able to breathe, let alone walk! Or the time, daughter had fallen off her mini bike in the front room and hit her shoulder, I put cold water on it, expecting just a bruise and it wasn’t until I picked her up and she let out such a scream, that I took her to the hospital, holding her out like an offering, begging them to stop the noise, and it turned out she had a dislocated shoulder and then there was the time….actually this list could go on and on, I am not the best person to be around in the event of any personal physical ailment!

In my defense, I treat myself the same, my typical remedies of hot or cold water, or failing that taking to your bed for a sleep didn’t seem to work. I was in agony!! I couldn't put hardly weight on it, and even had to buy some shoes that allowed me to still go out and look reasonably decent whilst containing my foot, which looked just like an elephants! Being a martyr to the cause (?! Which one is yet to be clarified!) a month later, I was still suffering. It was only when someone made a comment about my foot still looking bad. I finally admitted that I had better get myself off to hospital.

Now not one to make life simple for myself, I went to Frimley Park near where I work in Farnham, half expecting them to send me home with a flea in my ear. Can you believe it I even had my car washed (inside and out) whilst I was there, how ironic is that!

They were fabulous to me, and fortunately I didn’t have to wait too long to have it confirmed I had broken it - No wonder it hurt! It turned out that I was not allowed to drive and that meant a stay at home! (I had to ask them not to plaster it there and then and let me go to Winchester, which is closer to me).

How crap did I feel? I love my freedom and spend a great deal of time in my car travelling around seeing family, friends, etc!

Still 3 weeks later and I have learnt a number of very valuable lessons.

I have rarely asked for help, always dealing with everything life throws at me on my own, making me fiercely independent (hence the reaction to being stuck at home and not being able to drive). I have had to ask for and rely on help in getting backwards and forwards to the hospital, shopping, getting out and about and my friends and work colleagues have been absolutely fantastic. I have always felt unhappy about asking for favours, believing I was putting people out in some way.

During this time, someone said to me that in order for a relationship of any type to thrive there has to be not just giving but ‘taking’ or better still receiving, some sort of reciprocal arrangement. Imagine a bank account, where you only ever took money out to pay your bills, eventually it would go overdrawn and would reach a point where you couldn’t give any more. It needs to have some money coming back in. And so with relationships, in order to be able to give, you do need to receive something back in your emotional, physical, mental or spiritual bank or you end up ‘overdrawn’.

This accident was my way of dealing with being ‘overdrawn’.

Besides, doing things for other people that we love and care about makes us feel good, who am I to deprive them of that feeling!

From now on, I will ask a bit more often and it is a lesson that I will need to continually be reminded of, as changing a habit of a lifetime is not necessarily achieved overnight with help - ah! first reminder of asking for help! I will speak to Wendy and she can do some NLP on me!

So if you are one of life’s givers – beware! In order to continue to do that and maintain healthy relationships, you need to be able to receive too. And if this is something you find hard like me? Then maybe you have something that you believe about yourself that needs changing! Just look at the Relish website for limiting beliefs to see how you can do that easily and painlessly.

Why do today, what you can put off until tomorrow?

For as long as I can remember I have been late or rushing around at the last moment for all sorts of things. Social occasions, meetings, appointments, booking the car in for a service, sorting out tax and VAT etc. etc

It is so well know amongst friends and family that they automatically build in an extra half an hour to ensure that I arrive on time, which must be incredibly frustrating for them, I have Outlook to remind me of all the things that are due to be done at work, and the family now know that they need to chase me to make sure that things get done – it is a standing joke!

I have always reasoned that the important things in life get done, and the only person who suffers from my tardiness, is me, however, I know that is not strictly true, it is my committment to the task in hand that is at fault!

Naturally there are some things I am on time for – medical appointments where they charge you for not turning up, new clients and the odd occasion where to be late would be very rude, as opposed to fashionably late.

So why do I, and many others like me, live life like this?

Here I look at some of my more typical ‘excuses’ that I have used on a regular basis – see if any of these apply to you!

‘Excuses’ we use to delay starting and finishing tasks!

Personality – it’s the way I am
I love this one! I remember when I was learning to be a Myers Briggs Type Indicator practitioner, and discovered that part of my type was to leave making decisions until I absolutely had to – hoorah! It was my personality type, surely that meant it was not my fault! However, at the time I was a Project Manager, and this was not a good sign! It was then pointed out during the course, that whilst we did have a preferential style, many of us had learnt to ‘operate’ in our opposing preference equally well. So that put paid to that – I knew that I could and frequently did meet deadlines, so this could not be the only reason.

Mudane jobs
Of course, there was always the fact that I didn’t like what I was doing and therefore, had a fantastic ability to put off those tasks and jobs that I really didn’t enjoy until I really had no choice but to do them. I am sure many of you can identify the tax returns all being done in January! So clearly, I needed an incentive to get tasks done? Well a penalty actually, as most tasks with an incentive would naturally get done – rewards are always a great way to increase motivation! The best way is to get the mundane tasks done as quickly as possible or find someone else to do them!

New or large jobs
These have been known to trip me up from time to time – particularly ones where the whole process of getting them done is new to me such as new technology! We all know the saying “How do you eat an elephant? One bit at a time”, but what does this mean exactly? When looking at sorting out your finances for example, it is potentially going to take time to gather the information, look around for loans or interest free credit cards etc and it is so easy to put it off, rather than start on it. This is where planning can make a difference.

Thinking and planning time
Some tasks required an element of thinking and planning for how I was going to get them done and I was always too busy working my way through a “To do list” that would have done Tony Blair proud! I found that I barely had time to pause for breath! Several Time Management courses later, I am still prone to making the same mistakes, and yet I know that taking some precious time out to think and plan what has to be done, pays great dividends in terms of being able to get straight on with a task.

Avoidance tactics
This is a personal favourite of mine – finding all the jobs I love to do, to avoid doing the ones that need to be done. Even mundane jobs begin to look attractive. You know what I mean, you read emails you never normally have time for, you ‘tidy up and sort out’ the garage, cupboards, drawers, CD collections, you call that friend you have been meaning to for a while, and all in the name of avoiding the job in hand! Scheduling these tasks in at a time when you are at your best, can mean you get them completely really quickly!

Priorities
How much of what we do is important? I know that many tasks I do during the day, do not always move me in the direction I want to be going ie going to the gym. Like many people, I have taken my health for granted, and then finally decided that actually I really needed to be doing something about it – however, work and family commitments seemed to take up so much time! Of course, what I needed to understand was that without my health, there would be no work and family issues – it was indeed a priority!

These are my personal favourites, and I am sure that you may know of others. The first thing to stop putting things off is to first understand that you are indeed doing it. Then and only then, can you begin to understand what is stopping you and do something about it! Let me know what you do!

Relish People is the UK’s No.1 Life Design business, helping people who are dissatisfied with life, to get more out of it – call us now on 01252 783 524 to find out how we can help you!

Holidays

Wendy has now gone on holiday and left me - to Kenya - lucky thing!

I guess at this time most people are thinking about holidays that need to be booked or are already booked - which sort of person are you? organised and planned, or the 'I'll see what is available, pack on the day, buy everything at the airport' sort of person!

I am a great procrastinator (almost the title of a song methinks!)when it comes to my personal life and consequently whilst I know where I want to go, it is just getting around to all that searching, deciding and booking. In particular, I there are usually at least 3 of us, and that makes it all the more complicated, as you try to meet all their needs!

This year, I am hoping to go to New York, and I already know that there are loads of things to do once we get there, never mind where we stay, the dates we go blah, blah blah. So how can I at least make the holiday a lot more enjoyable?

Fortunately, once I make my mind up, I am like a whirlwind, and it all gets done really quickly. My personality type means that when I make decisions, I tend to take into account everyone to make sure they get what they want too!

As a result, I make each person in the holiday party, make a list of everything they would like to do when they are on holiday.

I then identify those things that everyone has mentioned and schedule them in over the holiday period.

I then look at the next most popular choice and schedule those in.

I then make sure everyone has the opportunity to do at least one of the things on their list (in case they have come up with the most random, bizarre or most expensive choice that no-one in their right mind would probably be in the least bit interested in doing) and make sure they get to do it!

Sounds complicated? Not really, it means everyone can be sure that they get some say in how they spend their holiday and besides it works for us and minimises any disputes about what we will do and when!The only stipulation I have for anyone who goes on holiday with me, is that I do need 'me' time - where I can relax and read, and read, ,and read....not so good for them!

Minimise any potential room for disputes by making sure every member of the holiday party has a say in what they do, even the youngest member of the party!

In the meantime, I am thinking about Wendy and what she is doing now....if she has any sense, laying back, with a glass in one hand, and a book in the other....chillll

If you want to understand more about what sort of holiday personality you are drop me an email marked "Holiday Personality Type" to enquire@relishpeople.co.uk and I will send you a quiz to help you find out!