A recent French news report called the old movie "Arsenic and Old Lace" springs to mind... but, in this case, the arsenic in question came in the form of the law. You know how it is, I’m regularly on about how stupid the law can be.
A couple of years ago, one of the few remaining manufacturers of lace in the Calais region – where lacemaking was once a booming industry – laid six employees off as it went through a hard time. Recently, a French court in Lille, ruled that it had done so illegally. Business at the lace maker wasn’t bad enough – under the legal definition of how bad business must get before you take any remedial action – to allow them lay anyone off. The court ruled that they must be compensated and reemployed.
The result? The company has had to go into liquidation with the loss of all seventy six jobs… oh, plus the six they should have kept on!
A Quick Tip
MINING YOUR BODY
Your body is a mine of information, a barometer of how you are feeling. Listen to it. Your heart may be beating a little too fast or your stomach churning, butterflies in the stomach or a tense nervous headache… all of these are simple, yet powerful, indicators that all is not well. That is, all is not well in your head for all these signs are indicators of flawed thought, that you think that you are annoyed, worried, stressed or anxious. Listen to your body and, if the signs are wrong, calm down and look after yourself here and now.
WHAT MIRACLES WOULD YOU LIKE?
A couple of nights ago, as I was getting ready for bed, I took a few minutes to watch a huge moon settle across the ridge of mountains to the northwest and, as I gazed, a shooting star fizzed across the sky in a big, slow arch, just above the moon... it was ludicrously false looking, like a bad Hollywood special effect and it was the first time I'd ever seen one.
For no apparent reason, I than went looking for Deepak Chopra's wonderful book, Synchrodestiny - great book, dreadful title and, as I opened up the introduction, I read the following words:
"Miracles happen every day... they are the shooting stars of everyday life. When we see shooting stars, their rarity makes them seem magical, but in fact, they streak across teh sky all of the time."
Synchronicity or what?! The point is that, as Chopra says, miracles are an everyday occurance - but we're never present enough to see them, to take advantage of them or, indeed, to create our own. We create our own miracles by being present, in the moment, to the reality of the moment, mindful of the miracles that we dearly want to create: our goals and objectives, small, medium and grand.
The steps involved for getting what you want out of life are simple: you need to decide what miracles you would most like to happen for you and you then need to turn up - fully turn up - to the here and now. You need to immerse yourself in the here and now and you need to train your mind, through meditation, for that explicit purpose. After that, you can simply watch all heaven breaking loose around you!
PS - If you don't like the word "miracle", that's your problem!
FANCY A LITTLE MORE?
The Psychology of Success will take place again in Dublin on November 9th. Describe by previous participants as "life changing" and "the most important learning of my living and working life" (you can read their testimonials here), this one day will enable you grab a hold of what's going on in your head. And, once, you've done that, all else changes. There are still a couple - just a couple - of places levft for this day. If you're interested in participating on Nov 9th, you can find all the details here...
If you're a consultant or coach, a HR leader or working in leadership development or talent management, or if, as a client told me last Friday, you are a guide for others, you may well be interested in psyberCoach. Following four years' development, psyberCoach is now online Have a look here...