Moments of Change


We, humans, use time and space to measure change, or the rate of change. The units differ depending on what we measure. Astronomers use light years, builders use meters, and quantum physicists use nanoseconds. No matter the unit, change is constant, within and without us. Furthermore, time is a concept represented by space. Have you ever seen or touched a minute?

Some changes happen regardless of our observation. Others force us to listen and have our eyes wide-open. What change has made you stop and think deeply, lately?

Resisting change is a common human mental habit. Other creatures flow with change in the environment surrounding them. Have you heard of a tree resist shedding its leaves in October to grow new ones in March? Or a flock of birds decides to stay in Alaska after the first sign of winter?

Whether we see change as an opportunity and flow with it, or consider it a threat and strive to prevent it from happening, most changes are natural and inevitable.

In business, change always hit the three vital elements of a project or a venture: Time, cost and resources. These three are interrelated in ways that are sometimes mysterious. Shorten the time, and cost goes up. ‘Restructure’ the organization, and time extends on its own terms.

What we must stay fully aware of is the following:

When you plan anything, make sure all variables involved are on the table.

What does that entail?

  • Know your financial capacity
  • Have key resources present
  • Understand, right from the main stakeholders, the time limits placed upon what you’re planning

My intention in this post is not to give you a project management crash course. You can find ample resources online and off-line on that. The intention is to raise our awareness, in life and in business, of the changes passing through our lives without us noticing, appreciating and effectively utilizing them.

One way to approach this is to start a journey of raising our awareness of both attention and intention.

While one’s attention could easily sway and wonder, following the feed of the five senses, and the flood of unguided thoughts and feelings, this can dramatically change if that attention follows a well-thought-of intention.

Attention could be the most valuable gift we’ve been given. It’s like a beam of light that we can focus on anything we want, intentionally or unintentionally. And that is the key lesson here:

Let’s choose, as much as we can, to focus the beam of our attention intentionally.

However, to do that, we need to have intentions, to begin with, don’t we?

How to set good intentions will require its own post. For now, it suffices to say that each one of us needs to set aside enough time and positive energy to know, write, and commit to a set of intentions that spans the dimensions of his or her life and business (as if they are separate 🙂

As that evolves, and as we re-shift our attention to be more and more inline with the intentions we’ve set to ourselves, those passing changes I mentioned above will become visible and accessible.

In conclusion, accepting change as a fact of our being, and then using the energy it presents to reach higher levels of awareness and achievement, is a prerequisite to true success.

Post Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash

TWM

The image below shows a recent addition to our StoreFour‘s Digital collection (a positive change), in case you’d like to use a new technology to measure time in conjunction with your cell phone.

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Patience, Persistence and Faith


Life is a journey worth taking, even though none of us has been given the choice to take it or not. Now that we are here, in it, let’s explore together some aspects that would make this inevitable journey enjoyable, as well as rewarding.

Remember learning to ride your first bike, competing with your classmates, working hard to get your first paycheck? None of those, and million other things, you’ve achieved or endured, would have seen the light without the jewel of all virtues: Patience!

Yet, patience alone is not enough, especially if it was serving the wrong dream; something that would lead to agony instead of joy, to disappointment not satisfaction. But do we always pick and choose what to bear and what not? A sudden illness, the death of a loved one, natural disasters, the list is long, very long.

Here comes another weapon in the face of the unfortunate: Persistence. One could be patient, but that patience is short-lived, fleeting as soon as the squeeze of the situation gets firmer. I’m not talking hypothetically, but rather factually.

Persistence is staying the course, no matter what it takes. Tough? You bet! Nevertheless, and most of the time, behind that mountain of toughness there would be a meadow of peace.

Now you might ask: Where do I get the momentum, the positive energy to be patient and persistent? You need a purpose you believe in. And that is the third element: Faith.

Without unwavering faith in what you do, and where you’re going, it’s almost impossible to endure patience, let alone persistence. Faith gives you the capacity to ‘see’ what’s beyond that which seems ugly and impossible. It gives a feeling of assurance and an enriching sense of possibility, of reaching that which you’ve been striving to reach.

In the next story we will talk about tips that would enhance our ability to attain and maintain these three vital life endowments: Patience, Persistence and Faith.

Stay tuned!

TWM

 

P.S. This post has also been published on Medium.com under Yaman Saleh, Owner of TWM

View at Medium.com