goal setting
Embrace The Weird – Love The Strange
Crazy times. I feel like a crazy person (not actually crazy). My mind and my body are going at 100 miles ( or 160.9344 kilometres in case you’re interested) an hour – I feel inspired and mental all at the same time. Loosing my marbles and then finding them again (and more) – I don’t know where to start and I love it!
Embracing the weird – loving the strange.
Enjoy the craziness in your lives lovelies
x
Change is as Good as a Holiday
Recently my whole world has been turned upside down. Everything I knew is suddenly gone. it’s been tough – very tough. But through this I’ve learnt that I am stronger than I thought – more resilient – and I deserve happiness.
Some of it shocked me – I had no idea it was coming. Some of it I instigated myself – and it was long overdue. But knowing that something is ending doesn’t ever make it easier to deal with. We have these ideas about who we are and what we are – and those are challenged and criticised not only by the people around us but by ourselves. We can be our own harshest critics – I know I certainly am.
Change can be painful and uncomfortable – the fear of the unknown can be paralysing – what to do next? Where do I go from here? With change – comes opportunity. You can reinvent yourself – find new meaning in the chaos of it all – dream new dreams – chase those dreams – become inspired and motivated all over again.
This has been one of the hardest and most daunting times of my life – but I am grateful. I am grateful for this opportunity to learn and grow – to move forward and to take charge of what I lost control of. I have learnt to put myself first – that fear is normal – that people are not always as good as you hope they are – that I trust myself – and above all else I deserve to be happy.
This period of change certainly isn’t comparable to a holiday at the moment – but I’m sure i’ll look back on this time in my life and see all that has come from it.
Sending love wanderlusters – you’ll be hearing from me again soon. Until then you can tweet me @JessicasWander.
One more reason why travelling changes your life.
I had an “ah-ha moment” a few years back when I was in Bali for one of Eoin Finn’s YES (Yoga Ecology Surf) retreats.
It was the final day of the retreat and I was getting dressed for our last dinner together in one of the bigger houses. I’d already packed up my backpack in preparation to move on to beautiful inland Ubud for the next week or so and I realised just how little I had with me and just how little I actually needed.
Fast forward to November 2013 when I was packing up my bags and getting rid of all my possessions. It was absolutely liberating. I don’t want to waste money on trivial things like more handbags, ornaments, clothes, shoes, jewellery, cosmetics or perfumes. When you really think about it how much do those things actually add to your life? How many hours working did you spend to be able to afford that watch your wearing to make sure you catch your train on time? Now I’m not saying I’ve gone all minimalist and have gotten rid of all my material possessions because I haven’t. I just realised that some of the best things in life are not all that expensive and I’d rather spend my money on a grand adventure than a grand gown that will sit in my closet until I find somewhere to wear it. I’d rather work hard at what I love doing then spend each day commuting in to a job that I don’t enjoy just so I can afford the Claude Maus jacket I’ve been lusting after.
Less is almost always more,
Jessica xx
p.s. I always love to hear from you guys, so please leave a comment below, or tweet with me @jessicaswander
Settling in to London life
As of today I’ve been in England for 45 days.
I’ve been up to York and walked along the walls, seen York Minster, Walked up on the North Yorkshire Moors, been to lots of pubs, been welcomed in to people’s homes to spend Christmas and New Years. I’ve been driven through old towns, slept the night in a dilapidated manor in the name of art, wandered the streets of London, partied till dawn and practiced yoga with one of my idols and made lots of new friends…
Needless to say its been a wicked time.
But now I’m ready to get settled in to living and working in London. The whole reason I decided to move here was because I just wanted to change the focus of my life to what I wanted rather that the life I was leading previously which was wholly focused on what other people wanted. That might sound a little selfish but I know that changing my life focus to be on what makes me happy I will then be in a position to actually help others more.
So now the challenge has been finding something that I want to do and finding someone who will give me the opportunity to do it. My work experience has been mostly in Finance Administration and not much else but I’m hopeful that the right opportunity will come along.
I feel like I am exactly where I need to be right now. I love London. I love my new friends. I love my old friends who have settled here and I love getting to know my cousins. Now is the time to get settled in, put my backpack away and create the life that I think I deserve…
Now back to finding the perfect flat…
Jessica xx
Discovering my bliss video update.
Video Posted on
Thank you to everyone who has contacted me in regards to my initial post about discovering my bliss.
Hope this answers some of the questions.
Have a beautiful day,
Jess.
Discovering my bliss
For a very Long time I believed that I just wasn’t one of the lucky ones. I didn’t believe that I had the talent, wisdom, upbringing and so on to chase my dreams and live a life of wonder. I truly believed that I was not smart enough, not good enough, not pretty enough, not tall enough, not funny enough, not charismatic enough, not dedicated enough… the list goes on and on.
As it turns out I was one of the lucky ones. I was lucky to come across some incredible people who saw in me what I didn’t see and encouraged me for the first time ever to pursue my dreams, my goals, my ambitions and create my own wonderful life free from my conditioned beliefs of what I could achieve. Problem was I didn’t really know what they were.
Two years ago if you’d asked me what I love doing I wouldn’t know how to answer you. I was way too busy worrying about everyone else in my life and what they wanted to do, what they wanted to achieve and how I could help them do that. I tried to do the “right thing” and tried to progress in my safe and secure job. Truth is that deep down I must have known that I didn’t really want to follow that path. I was the queen of self sabotage when it came to things that really didn’t mean much to me (I mean I got the grown up job wasn’t that enough?).
When I finally realised that all of my “problems” were just the result of my crappy self-image and conditioned beliefs that I’d taken on from people close me I changed. I no longer hated myself for being different from everyone else. I embraced my oddness and now I own my own “special brand of crazy” as I like to call it. This life is mine to create as I wish and I am smart enough, I am good enough, pretty enough, tall enough (I haven’t physically grown I’m still a short 5”4 ½), funny enough, charismatic enough and dedicated enough and everything else that I choose to be.
I’m still figuring out what it is that I want to do in my life and think I’ll always be exploring new ways to be happier and truly live my bliss. I’ve grown so much in the past few years that I hardly recognise myself now. I’m far more confident and outgoing then I’ve ever been, I can actually speak to people I’ve never met before at a normal volume (as opposed to mouse volume) and without going bright red and fumbling over all my words. This blog for me is sort of like medium for me to discover what it is that I truly love and to be able to share it with the world.
One of the best things I’ve done so far was to play the wish game. This utilises the law of attraction and Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques to break through anything that is holding you back from your wishes. The first time I played this game Gary the facilitator set me a task to do when I got home. He had me write down everything that I liked doing down in a big list. Initially it was really tough I only had about 5 things on my list and one of them was “secret one woman dance parties” which let’s be honest really isn’t something to build a new life around. But as I went on in the next few days I managed to build a massive list of all the things I loved, from there I decided to expand on that and created another list of all the things I wanted to do in my life and yet another list of all the places in the world I wanted to see. So effectively I wrote myself a bucket list. I knew that I could do everything on that list and more if I really wanted to but it gave me so many things to aim for and be excited about which was something I’d never experienced before for myself.
Now that I’ve ticked lots of things off my list and added so many more in the process I feel incredible. I still have moments of self-doubt and sometimes I temporarily revert to being every bit that awkward, embarrassed, nervous, quiet person that I once was but now when that happens I just gently remind myself that being like that is just not productive for anyone and if people don’t like the oddball that I am then it’s not really a big deal. What matters is being authentic to who I really am and if other people don’t like it then that’s fine. I’m not on this earth to please everyone as I once thought. I’m here to be me and experience my life as I want to, to share the love I have for the world with the world and live my bliss.
Since starting my journey I’ve discovered that so many people are silently going down a similar path as I was and believe that a wonderful life is just for the select few who are privileged enough to have been born with brilliance and clear goals. The truth is that everyone has their own challenges to face and their own demons to battle. I really hope that through sharing my journey I can inspire other people to really own their own experience and live their bliss by discovering what it is that they truly love.
Namaste,
Jessica.
xx
Please comment or email me if you have any questions or for more information on the wish game.
jessienicole30@hotmail.com
This is a card from that I picked up during the wish game.
Dream Interview with Tegan Steele
Dream Interview with Tegan Steele.
What a great interview with the incredible Tegan Steele. She is a great friend of mine and a true inspiration.
You can learn more about Tegan on her blog.
http://vegiegirl88.wordpress.com/
Happy Reading. xx
Goal Setting
We’ve all heard the phrase “failing to plan is planning to fail” before and we all plan things every day, whether it’s what to do with our weekends, a holiday, a business plan etc…
Too often we don’t have a plan for our lives. This then can result in feeling stuck in monotony and dreaming of more. That is why it’s so important to set ourself goals that we can work towards.
“If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things” – Albert Einstein
This is the model I use to set goals and I’ve found it to be really effective.
- Find yourself a goal buddy. This can be anyone! maybe a friend, a family member, a partner, a colleague. Just make sure it’s someone who you’re happy to share your inner most desires with. This is a great thing to do in a group if possible, but most importantly it’s someone to keep you accountable for what you set out to do.
- Make a list of things you love doing, things that are important to you (you’re highest values) and just keep writing. write about what you’re ideal life looks like, the kind of people you want in that life, businesses you want to start, the adventures you’ll go on, causes you’ll support, how you’ll contribute to the world and anything else you want to achieve. Get clear with your vision, have fun with it and let it all flow out! Read over it and imagine what it would feel like to achieve all you’ve written.
- Once you’re familiar with what you’ve written and you’ve connected with the feelings associated with that break them down into smaller achievable goals with attached dates, start with what you want to have achieved in 3 months, move on to 6 months, 1 year, 3 years and then make sure you dream big and set yourself 10 year goals.
- Make sure you write these down somewhere you can see them every day, you can write them on a business card and carry that with you, stick them up on your mirror or next to your bed, I keep a copy of mine on my desktop, on my mirror and on my vision board next to my bed.
- Set a clear reminder in your calendar after 3 months is up and review on what you’ve achieved, call up your goal buddy and share with them how far you’ve come. See how your tracking on your 6 month goals and refresh your other goals. Once we start to see what we can achieve in just three months your dreams get bigger and better, keep adding to them and re-connect with your vision. This is how big things are achieved.
If you don’t achieve your goals in your set time frame don’t worry about it. Some things can take a little more time than expected. By taking steps towards achieving these we get a great feeling of achievement and a new vigour for life.
“Glory lies in the attempt to reach one’s goal and not in reaching it” – Mahatma Gandhi
Good luck with your goals, I wish you all the best. I’d love to hear from you so please comment.
Jessica. xxx
