All Posts by Darrell Gurney

November 23, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Flight-Focused

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“Clutter is not just physical stuff. It’s old ideas, toxic relationships, and bad habits. Clutter is anything that does not support your better self.” –Eleanor Brownn

It’s amazing the amount of physical unconsciousness that can surround us in life…simply because of the wild card of “sentimentality” that we can often play.

Whether my mother encouraged me to hold onto items because I might want to “look at them when I get old” or my father was the garage and shed black-hole filler does not determine the surroundings for my Big Game 2017 future…if I get and remain conscious.

To live inside of a real NEW YEAR on the rise means that our eyes, ears, environments, mind and heart must be forward-focused vs. rear-view-mirror fixed.

Living inside a new possibility requires being nimble, quick, light and bright…without the weight (physical, mental, emotional and spiritual) of past, past, past globbing onto us at every turn.

The critical and necessary ocular redirect toward what is in front of us (in life, purpose, passion, play) vs. what has taken place behind us is the key action to take.

Dropping past-based ballast and replacing with flight-focused environmental influences creates lightness and directional guidance.

Exchanging the diploma for a dream board? Substituting an old picture with a graphic plan? Swapping a souvenir for a framed list of intentions?

All are ways to detach from the lines so that our Big Year 2017 Balloon can gain the altitude and attitude for a our best game ever.

Let’s do this 2017!

Got flight-focused surroundings?

“The true heart of organizing is about gaining your freedom.” –Unknown

November 16, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Agile

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“If nothing ever changed, there would be no such things as butterflies.” –Wendy Mass

Things are going to change.

We can’t stay fixed on people, places or organizations resembling what they did yesterday. For sure, we don’t want to fixate on ourselves resembling yesterday.

What makes change tolerable, and even fun, is being agile.

It’s not only a word used to describe someone nimble and quick — like Jack jumping over the candlestick — but a process utilized in software development which focuses on short phases of work and frequent reassessment and adaptation of plans.

Giving up the expectation that anyone or anything will stay the same or that, in adapting, we’ll “get it right the first time” allows us the patience to stay on the playing field…with an emphasis on “play”.

Try a new approach? Conduct an experiment? Design a new context within which to hold it all?

Where can you bring playful adaptation to changing plans, people and places today?

Got agile?

“Success today requires the agility and drive to constantly rethink, reinvigorate, react and reinvent.” –Bill Gates

November 9, 2016: TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Unknown Faith-Face

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“Whenever we proceed from the known into the unknown we may hope to understand, but we may have to learn at the same time a new meaning of the word ‘understanding.’” –Werner Heisenberg

Life, work, relationships, world events can be full of surprises.

We generally don’t like surprises…unless we hear there will be lots of friends and presents around. Some of us don’t even want those.

The unexpected and unforeseen is bar none the greatest opportunity for exploring within ourselves what we’re made of and, if we notice some less-than-fortified materials or insecure foundation, beginning a process of rebuilding and strengthening.

In the end, new structures built are stronger than those which existed before because of the benefit of learning that took place in between builds.

It takes faith vs. the natural, first-blush fear to best get to work capitalizing on the unknown.

Where can you embrace and faith-face the unknown in your life and times today?

Got unknown faith-face?

“Even though my future is uncertain, I choose to brace the unknown and have faith that Everything will be “ok”.” –Rik Bertrand

November 2, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Tripresence

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.” –Thich Nhat Hanh

The quote above makes inspiring sense, yes?

But what about those we don’t “love”…such as the folks in traffic we don’t know, the customer service person on the phone we’re working out an issue with, the big behemoth of an organization that we either work for or must engage with?

Perhaps “presence” has three aspects we can consider.

One is our actually being “present”, which means not only staying out of the past and future so as to be in this moment with these people right now…but also being present to our internal state of thoughts, feelings and emotions vs. projecting them.

Another is the “presence” we bring of our Self into any situation. The small s “self” rarely brings the same value that our big S “Self” affords.

Yet one more is the “Presence” which we allow to move through and guide us, whatever you consider that bigger-than-us intelligence to be.

Where can a triad of Presence impact life in and around you today?

Got tripresence?

“Presence is more than just being there.” –Malcolm Forbes

October 26, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Undercover Talents

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“Doing easily what others find difficult is talent; doing what is impossible with talent is genius.” –Henri Frederic Amiel

Ever notice that someone has to hold up a mirror for you to see the nose on your own face?

That’s the way it is for many of us around our most natural and blended-into-the-wallpaper gifts and talents.

In supporting individuals in both career and Back Forty bigger Self-expressions, we help folks explore their so-easy-it’s-unnoticeable gifts and talents picked up along the road of life.

For example, I was recently acknowledged by a minister for whom I write a weekly promotional blurb, used to advertise his congregational talk each week. For me, it takes 30 seconds to a minute to pop it out once he emails me his general topic. For him, he says it would take hours and be like shoving needles in his eyes.

Be On Alert: there are things you do amazingly and unnoticeably but, if pointed out, you operate under the assumption “Oh, that’s no big deal…anyone can do that.”

But guess what?? They can’t!! And you can!!

Discerning and acknowledging your own closer-than-your-breath and nearer-than-your-hands-and-feet aptitudes can be a great boost to Self-esteem…and possibly even point you in directions of fulfillment you’ve heretofore been blind to.

Got undercover talents?

“Your talent is God’s gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God.” –Leo Buscaglia

October 19, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Flagplant

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“Strive for progress, not perfection.” –Anonymous

It’s way easier and ingrained to acknowledge the hugeness of the gap between where we are and where we want to be…

Than to recognize the daily, weekly, monthly or annual progress toward our goals.

The opportunity of growth is to be inspired by what can be, notice the land that must be claimed, and turn the challenges of claiming it into acts of play and learning.

Heck, even an hourly planting of a flag of accomplishment today — in the face of the gap of growth — can render us more self-esteemed by days end than where we started.

How many flags of progress can you count today?

Got flagplant?

“Pain plants the flag of truth within a rebel fortress.” –C.S. Lewis

October 12, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Endure-Dance

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“Development is an endurance exercise with incremental improvements.” –Sri Mulyani Indrawati

Building character, confidence, a skill, a career, a business, a country all take time.

There’s the dance uphill from unconscious incompetent all the way to unconscious competent.

It requires endurance for sure, and just as much patience…for when we or it ain’t happening.

I tell my Back Forty and coaching clients that, to the degree we want to grow, it requires an equal amount of self compassion.

Without the latter, it’s impossible to hang in there long enough for the nurturing of that which we want to build.

Ever stood over a fledgling plant and screamed “Grow!!”  How’s that working for ya?

Where can you turbo-boost your desired growth by directing forgiveness toward yourself today?

Got endure-dance?

“Heroism is endurance for one moment more.” –George F. Kennan

October 5, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Unsettledness

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them.” –Ralph Waldo Emerson

The words

familiar

normal

easy

cozy

regular

comfortable

standard

ordered…

when juxtaposed with

growth

expansion

breakthrough

stretch

change

miracle…

often create oxymorons.

Where in your work, life or purpose for being on the planet can you embrace unsettledness today…and do something about it?

Where’s the next “home”?

Got unsettledness?

“It is good to feel lost… because it proves you have a navigational sense of where “Home” is. You know that a place that feels like being found exists. And maybe your current location isn’t that place but, Hallelujah, that unsettled, uneasy feeling of lost-ness just brought you closer to it.” –Erika Harris

September 28, 2016, TGIW: 2 FREE eBOOKS Unhumping Hump Day…Igbliss

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“To know that you do not know is the best.” –Lao Tzu

We pride ourselves on the knowledge we have gained, either through standard education and/or the “school of life.”

Let’s face it: there’s something to be said for experience and wisdom. And one thing to be said is too often one word: limitation.

Someone once pointed out to me that it’s possible to be “too smart”, as that million-ways-of-explaining-something nature often prevents the key source of progress and development: action.

In college, I heard the phrase “The As and Bs end up working for the Cs and Ds.”

Look for yourself at your world, and the greater world around you. Not to knock intelligence, but the ability to be unreasonable (act outside of limiting reasons/

excuses) does not always arise from wisdom.

On one hand, there’s no integrity in promoting uneducated ignorance. Yet, on the other hand, it’s highly honorable to eradicate questionable wisdom…especially when it limits forward thinking and expansion.

As we seek to reep the most goodies from our career and life experience, perhaps some ignorance of what we can or can’t do or what is or isn’t possible in our life can source more bliss.

Got igbliss?

“It takes a very long time to become young.” –Pablo Picasso

September 21, 2016, TGIW: Unhumping Hump Day…Directionality

By Darrell Gurney | Blog

“The good life is a process, not a state of being. It is a direction not a destination.” –Carl Rogers

In the littlest and seemingly most inconsequential ways, we make choices every moment of every day which, added together, go a particular direction.

Do we face a new technology and choose to entertain a story of how we “don’t do new technology well” or approach it like a fascinated 18yr old?

Do we see a homeless person and choose a thought pattern of sadness or simply send out a silent blessing?

Do we come upon a personal or financial growth choice and go the fear-based, play-safe route or the the expansive, risky-business route?

The late Alvin Toffler, great futurist and author of Future Shock, The Third Wave, and Powershift said “You’ve got to think about big things while you’re doing small things, so that all the small things go in the right direction.”

What little nexus points can you find in your day to be conscious of the direction you’re choosing?

Got directionality?

“I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving: To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it, but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor” –Oliver Wendell Holmes