Yesterday: Ferrying the kids to swimming lessons, doing laundry, grocery shopping, wiping small bottoms.
Today: Breakfast function with Arianna Huffington surrounded by hundreds of this country’s most successful business women and a handful of celebs. (Sidenote – If you happen to be considering cosmetic surgery at all, find out who KAK’s surgeon is… she is looking amazing!)
Tomorrow: Lunch function with Seth Godin
Working part time means my weekdays can be in complete contrast, going from the mundane to the glamorous and everything in between. And although it’s crazy and chaotic and at times I have wanted to throw it all in, I do love it… It’s my ‘happy chaos’.
So, the alarm was set for the crack of dawn to get myself sorted for a 7am start in the city. This meant getting dressed in the dark so not to wake the small person who made his way into our bed during the wee hours, which is becoming a bit of a habit lately. Must get onto fixing that, but probably easier to just buy a king size bed!
Arianna was fantastic as expected. Engaging, warm, honest and also very funny.
Known as a sleep evangelist after falling asleep at her desk and waking in a pool of blood back in 2007, she spent some time covering the topic of SLEEP.
It’s been over 5 years since I’ve had a decent amount of SLEEP, and by decent amount, I mean 8 hours STRAIGHT. A whole big fat block of blissful, heavy SLEEP!
The odd 7 hour block here and there has given me a glimpse of how good you feel and how much better you function with some decent shut eye. But it’s the consistency I struggle with. Night time is ‘my time’ and I’ve become a bit of a night owl. Hmm, maybe time to change all that!
Arianna says that when you consistently get 8 hours of sleep per night, at those times when you do start to feel a bit tired, you really notice just how crap you are, at EVERYTHING… from your mood, the ability to focus, and basically every part of our mental and physical performance as humans!
So she encouraged us all to get just an extra 30 mins of sleep per night.Ok, cool.. I think I can actually do that!
She then went on to talk about her 12 steps which she details in her new book ‘Thrive’ – The third metric to redefining success and creating a happier life.
So here’s a summary of the bits I took in from her keynote today:
- Aussies are a bunch of strivers and she says we should “Strive to thrive”.
- Giving can mean lots of things including how we interact with others every day.
- You don’t create from your inbox – so why do we spend so much time there?
- Pick things that no longer serve you and drop them, ie watching a TV show or a hobby that you’re not really that great at. It’s ok to give something up in order to create space and invite new things to come in. It’s liberating.
- If you focus on what to be grateful for even in tough times, it’s easier to overcome those hard times and move from struggle to grace.
- The world tends to tells us what’s important. You need to put your hand on heart and say no… this is what’s important.
- Put your oxygen mask on first – Take care of ourselves and we will be better at everything else.
- Upon waking in the morning, take 1 minute to set your intention for the day. Set your agenda before the world sets it for you.
- ‘Busy-ness’ should not be a badge of honour. We need to change the workplace culture.
- Creating space in our lives is critical.
- Success defined by power and money is not enough. Success must include health, wisdom, wonder and giving.
- Instead of onward and upwards, we should say ‘Onward, upward and inward – to focus more on our wellbeing and internal strength.
- Why can’t we learn from her health crisis? Why wait until it happens to us to realise?
- Turn off devices at night… make your bedroom device free. Arianna sites Padmasree Warrior, the chief technology officer at Cisco as her role model who is known to sleep 8 hrs, meditates and has a self imposed digital detox every Saturday. If the CTO of Cisco can do it… anyone can. Even God took 1 day off after moving heaven and earth, so why can’t you?
- Mum you’ll be happy to hear this one… the Shabbat concept is really nice and we all need a day off… a REAL day off. Not allowing time for quiet reflection and recharging is just not sustainable.
So much to take in and I’m glad I’ve documented it as I know I’ll come back to this for reminders during those times when the happy chaos turns to shit.
So I’m off to bed 30 minutes earlier and upon waking in the morning, I shall set my intention for the day.
Onwards, Upwards and Inwards…
Shannon x
PS. Got home and was asked by C “how was your breakfast?” and “Who was it with? I said “Adrianna Huffington (founder of the Huffington post)” he said: “Never heard of her.” Ahh… the person who could use her advice the most has never even heard of her!
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So what would you give up in order to create space and invite new things to come into your life?
How much shut eye do you get per night?
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OMG!! I now want to turn the kids cubby house into a She-Shed. Surely they wouldn’t mind?! #3 is my fave (pictured). Which do you like?
