5 Things to do this year (Again)

Hallo to everybody again.

It's been quite some time since my last post. 6 months have passed with many things that happened and that kept me away from this Blog.

During these holidays though I read a bit and this picture made me remind the post I wrote 1 year ago (Things to do in 2014).

Were my resolutions also completely missed?

Curiosity killed the cat and I went immediately to check.
The answer was: yes and no.

I had listed targets so generic that could not be measured (except some quite general things) so, sorry to say, these were not resolutions nor things to do.
These were only good will thoughts.

In that list I made most of the mistakes that people can make when writing down such lists.

- The target was too far or not clear. Exercising is a nice thing. How much and to reach which level is something that people must have in mind. The result is that today I gained some kilos although I made more exercise than last year
- There is no idea of the consequences of these things. In a word, as these are things we never experienced before we cannot predict how better we will feel when these will be reached. And then, why should we suffer to get there?

What happened in reality was that I met people that changed a lot of small things in my life. I must really thank all of them (and I normally do personally) because today I am probably better than last year.
This is my first thing.
1) THANK PEOPLE THAT ARE DOING GOOD THINGS TO YOU. I hope I will meet more and more people that will be important to make me a better person.

On the other hand I have also questioned some people and found myself completely upset for some decisions. Paralelly then
2) TELL PEOPLE YOU DISAGREE BUT NEVER TAKE IT PERSONAL (...if it's not personal). This is something I need to work a lot, expecially not to "overheat" and to keep my pressure down.

In the last months the time that was left for myself was really minimal. I decided to spend it with my family, my children and my "better half". I neglected some of the things that I loved to do though but that I considered less important.
But now it's the time to
3) DO ONE THING YOU NEVER DID BEFORE. It doesn't matter if it's learning a new language, do paragliding, walk on top of the Himalaya or run the New York Marathon. Just find one thing and work to do it.

This will not be very simple as I am often travelling. My job, that I love, brings me a lot around the world, meeting different cultures in different places and keeping me away from my family.

Now, though, it's time to share some of this with them so
4) SPEND SOME DAYS WITH YOUR BELOVED ONES IN A SPECIAL PLACE. There are a lot of places that I visited and inspired me a special "flavour" to share with my family. Just pick one...

Last one, that seems obvious but it's not (at least it was not for me in this 2014)
5) LOOK AFTER YOURSELVES. If your body tells you something's wrong check it immediately. "What is always speaking silently is the body." Listen to it. Do not take it as granted.

That's all for today.

See you soon
Ciao

The little Chemist

It's spring!
Finally the temperature is going better and the days, after a very long wet period, are starting being more pleasant.
The garden is then the natural place to spend the day. The first two days though are used to bring it back to a "proper shape". It's not only cutting the grass but trying to get rid of all the things that were put outside during winter (you do not wish to go out in winter at out temperatures).

In doing this you suddenly realize the real essence of our economy today...

We got rid of an entire big bag of games that, I am sure, my children used veeeery little. Then suddenly this video came to my mind.

99% of the things that are moved around the US is TRASHED AFTER 6 MONTHS!!!
I do not think Europe is so different.

But why is this happening? Is it just a question of buying useless things?

I am sure that whoever has got children agrees that they much more than what they can enjoy. They are simply getting more than what they really need.

This comes from a "natural" reason.
Two of the chemicals that are responsible for the "feelings", the Seratonine and the Oxitocine, are generated by growing the sense of "relationship" and "feeling of love and trust".
In reality these are chemicals that we have since thousand years and their main target was to keep us alive favoring the "sense of belonging to a group" and making the group healthy i.e. having always food and protecting themselves from dangers.
And today it is artificially generated. One of the ways is to give presents, to give something regardless is needed.
It is somehow like the famous quote of the movie "The Devil's Advocate" where Al Pacino, describing love, was saying "Overrated. Biochemically no different than eating large quantities of chocolate."
So today we are BIOCHEMICALLY simulating a atavic behavior giving presents 99% of which are thrown in a bin in 6 months.
And in our environment, this is even more required as the Fantastic 4 chemicals (Endorphins, Dopamine, Seratonine and Oxitocine) are always fighting against...

CORTISOL that is generated by the stress and anxiety

The original function of Cortisol was in reality to raise our attention and pump sugars in our muscles either to fight or to run.
Good if you are in a forest some thousand of years ago.
Good if it happens once every now and then.
Not good if stress is continuous.

So, among the usual bad feelings, the usual sleepless nights, the usual problems that stress is generating we are also trying to generate some "good chemicals" to fight it by doing the WRONG THINGS.

And we go back to the usual point.

Life is simple. It's just about doing what you REALLY like with the people you REALLY like. Doing it well and enjoy it. But most of all, do good things for people that is around you at work and at home. Create a sense of safety and trust.

Do not try to artificially feel well. It's not working on the long run and does not help yourself.

Music is also a good way to grow one of the Fantastic 4.
That's my favorite song (and also my children's) these days .

Enjoy
Have a great week

It's just a virus

This winter has been quite good so far.

I don't know if that was because of the mild conditions or because I built more immune defences but fortunately I did not catch any flu nor strange things during my holidays.

Every year infact, as soon as I stop working...
Bam a tiny virus decides to take over the control of my body and obliges me to stay in bed for some days.
Last week though, I started my personal battle with the flu. I was almost giving up but at the end I limited that toa cold and headache.
Clearly, all the ladies that are reading this Blog would say... here it is.
The usual man-flu; it's even been formally defined.

Though for me, average italian man, this kind of flu takes away mental and phisical strength.
And this week this has been worsened by some events that people I know and I work with had to face.

Problems, things like a child or a relative being seriously ill or a job lost that happened and that I did not know anything about because they were either keeping very secret (and I can understand them) or that suddenly recently happened. Everything this week, and it really touched me.

I tend not to believe to "signs" but, probably because I am getting older, I took these events happening during my "man flu" as something to think about how little I should complain. Funny enough, I also got this message from a friend of mine...

Be kind. Always.
Tough target isn't it.
Because if there are people that are VISIBLY fighting a battle, and then it's reasonably easy to be kind with them, and others that are keeping everything inside.
But when you fight you do not need other enemies but allies regardless your battle is outside or inside you. And someone kind at you is an extra help to find the strenght to overtake the problem.

I invite everybody to see this video. Again quite a casual thing that happened this week, a lead I got that is perfectly fitting into the mood of the week.

There is something to learn from every event of our life. Clearly the bad ones are the worse to overtake but WE WILL BE ABLE to overtake them only if we are ready and prepared to do it.

Prepare yourself, increase your competence and live well your life to tackle the bad moments.

Never give up. Never stop learning. Stand up and keep on going.
Have a nice week end

Opportunity

My last Blog ended saying that I found the way to do meditation.
Everything started because of something wrong. I wanted to go out running and the Ipod was out of batteries.
To that date, running was for me trying to keep fit and listen some music. Running=Ipod.
It always seemed impossible to me go away from that equation.

But that day everything changed.

I started listening to my body, myself breathing. And that was my mantra. IIIIIIIIIIIIIIN OOOOOOOOOOOOut. I could finally clean my mind. IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOut.

That was great. Being able to clean my mind listening to my body. This is the great thing of a meditative (not competitive) running.
My "running passion" started from there. It started from a need (as most of the things that really work) and developed into my hobby.

And thanks to the hobby I found how much running was similar to my job.
Few points that will clear this concept
1st: You must know the "battlefield". Not knowing the track or the circuit will bring you to a bad distribution of your effort
2nd: You must know who you are and where are your strength. To properly distribute the effort you must know where you are good and where you can push
3rd: Control: listen to your body to see where you are and see if you can reach the target.
4th: Understand your weak points: look where you can improve and work on that weaknesses
5th: In a race you must know your opponents: never try to follow the others. Always run to the level that maximise your strenght according to who you are (and who you want to be).

This is what people should do if they need to go and look for OPPORTUNITIES for their business. Before investing any second (REMEMBER that time is the most valuable resource that we have) try to understand the battlefield, the competitors and your strenghts, understanding which is the problems you can solve.

I read a great book (in italian) that gives a nice description for that. It is the Art of war modified for the managers.
I am sure that there is also a similar version in English but, for the Italians or who speaks Italian, this is quite nice.

MMMMMMeditation

Coaching. That's the word of the decade. To find someone that is capable to take out of you everything you have inside. Sometimes very well hidden.

I have recently done some very good trainings. There is a coach I like the most, Sebastiano Zanolli (www.sebastianozanolli.com). He's a brilliant speaker and has great motivational skills.
In one of his training he spoke about meditation to clean your mind and reduce the stress.
I always thought that the mind has got a maximum capacity, like a bottle. When you exceed with stress, data or anything else there is an explosion. This is why, being able to find a way to reduce the level, was a great idea.
The process is easy... you start thinking about nothing for few minutes. Three just to start with. And to help you there is the mantra to be a magnet for your attention. It doesn't necessarily be any clever or mystical phrase. Just a sound to keep your attention away from the usual things.
Three minutes... simple.
My mantra was easy. TORO, TORO, TORO (My football team).
Three minutes. Go!
TORO TORO TORO TOR... I must call Andrea... ouch no!
Again. GO!!!
TORO TORO TORO TORO TOR... Tomorrow I must remember that...

Well that was IMPOSSIBLE.

But then... I found the solution.