Arminda Lindsay

Being On Purpose

Pompeii’s Got Dirt

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Pompeii's Got DirtHistory First

Pompeii: ancient city best known for its notable volcanic ash covering it received on August 24, 79 AD, by the impressive Mount Vesuvius.

Pompeii: ancient port town lesser known for its impressive aqueduct system that pumped water throughout the entire city.

The streets of Pompeii were nightly flooded with water to clean them from the dust and dirt of the day’s activities, allowing for a clean start the next morning for its 20,000 residents. To compensate for the daily flooding, city planners used stones as crosswalks that could be used in times of high water to still cross a street by foot. The three stones you see pictured here indicate this road was a major thoroughfare in Pompeii. Less-trafficked streets had fewer stones across. Regardless of the street, the stones were all equally-sized and spaced to allow for chariots to pass through unencumbered. Visible today are deep wheel ruts from heavy chariot use on every street I walked.

Let’s metaphor.

Your Ruts

If you were to analyze your regular thoughts and behaviors — the ones you have without consideration or intention because you think or behave them every single day — what would fall into that category?

Have you been riding your mental chariot so frequently over the same roads that you’ve created ruts? I guarantee you that’s true. We sometimes refer to those as neural pathways. And those paths can run very deep. When we create neural pathways we don’t usually do so consciously.

Think of it this way: Imagine standing in the middle of a university campus with an extensive sidewalk system that provides access to every single building. However, as you look across the green spaces between the sidewalks you notice well-worn dirt paths that are the clear pathways walked by the students, natural paths connecting a shorter or easier distance between A and B.

This is exactly what happens inside your brain as you introduce a thought and think it over and over and over again. You’re creating new pathways, new patterns of thinking. Habits are created in this exact way until we no longer think about them, we just do.

Your Stepping Stones

And oftentimes, those patterns of behavior we’ve been running for so long and whose tracks run so deep, are not serving us, so we also lay stepping stones to justify, excuse or skirt around the thought or the behavior when needed. This skipping across the pathway is our way of avoiding getting wet when the guilt or the embarrassment or the self-judgment comes rushing through.

The accusations or awarenesses or the judgments can come from ourselves (most often) or they can come from someone else or from an organization or a cultural expectation that we don’t feel we are meeting. So we skip across them.

Your Dirt

We experience the guilt, embarrassment, and judgment as dirt, something that we shouldn’t have, but do and think skipping across the stones we’ve carefully placed and positioned will allow for a cleanse. Maybe this looks like yet another resolution to make a change, or a recommitment to doing things differently from now on. The skipping across can also look like defensiveness, self-justification, blaming others for where or why you are where you are right now, and all of these thoughts and behaviors are born out of fear.

Real Cleansing

Of the items on your list, can you imagine what it would feel like to cleanse yourself of any of them? To purge yourself of the weight of those behaviors and thoughts?

In my experience, creating a new neural pathway takes 33 consecutive days and I love making new trails in my brain!

The old wheel ruts will likely remain, but whether you continue using them is entirely up to you. If you give yourself some alternative routes to follow, you might just surprise yourself with how easy the new paths are to use.

If you’d like the digital calendar I created for myself and that I share with my clients, send me an email (coach @ armindalindsay dot com) and I’ll happily share the file with you. I use this to keep track of my daily path creation and by the time I’ve filled in the calendar, I no longer need it to remind me where to walk and what new behavior I’m employing.

I also offer a unique program that includes just two sessions with me for individuals in need of additional support in rewiring themselves from particularly difficult and long-standing behaviors that no longer serve them. If you’re interested in learning more about this highly-effective and individualized program, please send me an email (coach @ armindalindsay dot com) and tell me more about what’s going on and what behavior or habit you can’t seem to cleanse.

Choose to wash away any pathways that are no longer serving you and ride your chariot in a new direction.

Loving you,
arminda

Caesar Salad

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Caesar Salad

I love a good Caesar Salad; the one I make at home is my favorite. Wait. Actually, the version I make is the only Caesar Salad I ever eat. I’m particular that way. Julius Caesar, as it turns out, has nothing to do with our obsession with Caesar Salad. The man credited with the creation of said salad is an Italian-born chef named Caesar Cardini. Stories conflict with the exact reason Chef Cardini threw together the exact ingredients he did, but regardless of the reason, in the early 1920s an amazing salad was born.

Julius Caesar, as it turns out, was so popular a ruler in Ancient Rome that after the senators decided to murder him they had a public outcry on their hands to which they had to respond quickly before the widespread displeasure put them out of their jobs. Their solution? They agreed to cremate Julius Caesar in the public forum and then they deified him.

And on the site where the 23 stab assassination took place now stand three trees.

It’s the trees I want to discuss.

I don’t know what variety of tree they are — all over Rome are planted amazing umbrella pines, but I believe they’re also this same beautiful evergreen.

I come from a large family with seven siblings. My mom was always having a baby — or so it seemed. More significantly, each time a baby joined our family, my father planted an evergreen in that child’s honor. These trees were special focal points in our yard as we watched them grow through the years alongside the child for whom the tree had been planted.

Just like the three trees in Rome impress upon me their significance because of the point in history they represent, the trees my father planted with love to commemorate the birth of new members into our family fill me with love and gratitude.

And just like the trees in Rome or in my dad’s yard, you also have visible (to you) plantings you have made at the most significant moments in your life.

1. What are those moments?
2. What did you plant to commemorate the event?
3. How do you feel when you look at those internal trees today and the growth you’ve experienced since they were planted?
4. How can you acknowledge yourself for your own historical significance?

Make yourself a big bowl of Caesar Salad and catalog your own historical significance.

Do more than casually consider a moment and call this exercise complete.

Really ponder and consider which parts of your history are most significant and why. Write it down. And after you feel your list is complete, read it out loud to yourself, or talk through each event and why it made the final list. Then really acknowledge yourself for where you are today as a result of how you’ve grown.

Loving you,
Arminda

Growth Spurt

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Growth SpurtAs a little girl I experienced severe growing pains, particularly in my legs. I often woke in the night hurting so much I would cry out and into my room would come my father, with his soothing voice to calm me and take me in his arms to assure me everything was alright. I can still feel the exhaustion of my small body lying rigid and wracked with pain, hot wet tears forcing their way through my closed lids, dropping off the short cliff at the corners of my eyes, cascading into cold pools inside my ear cavities. My father would gently massage the calves of my legs with rubbing alcohol, all the while reminding me that everything was alright, that sometimes growing bigger can hurt, but the hurt wouldn’t last, and that my legs would be stronger in the morning.

At the time my own young daughter started experiencing growing pains of her own, she and I were living with my parents. When she cried out in the night it was my father who would go to her room, rubbing alcohol in-hand, with his soothing assurances of how okay everything was. Even after she and I moved into our own home, whenever the middle of the night pains showed up, my very little growing girl would phone her grandfather, waking him from his sleep, and he would get dressed, drive to our house (rubbing alcohol in-hand) and calmly put her back to sleep with his soothing reminders of how much stronger she would be in the morning.

I am so grateful to my dad for guiding me through the pain of physical growth and for showing me how to care for myself when I’m growing internally. What I understand today that was difficult for me to understand as a little girl in the middle of the night:

1. Massage elevates serotonin, dopamine & oxytocin levels. Serotonin and dopamine are neurotransmitters secreted in the brain and oxytocin is a hormone — all three of which are elevated through massage and touch! Studies on the benefits of each of these have shown lots of things, but primary to our discussion here is that increased levels of these naturally-occurring goodies is a promoted sense of well-being, contentment, and decreased levels of anxiety. Get a pedicure and ask for an extra long massage on your feet and calves. Schedule a full-body or neck and shoulder massage. Get a hug. Give a hug. This doesn’t have to be difficult or cost any money.

2. Growth sometimes hurts. While pain is not a prerequisite for growth, just know that painful growth moments are very normal. Hurt is not a singular episode; it recurs and shows up when it’s least expected and is rarely, if ever, welcome. Also know that everyone experiences hurt. Everyone.

3. The hurt won’t last. I promise; it won’t be forever. If you can relax and take deeper breaths, your attention will shift away from the severe pain and you’ll soon gain the slightest distance from the epicenter of hurt. Breathe even more deeply into that space and gain more distance. Repeat.

4. You are okay. Look around. Is there someone to remind you how okay you are? Someone who understands the hurt of growth because they’ve experienced growth, too? Someone who can hold the space for you to hurt or to hold you literally while you feel it all. (It’s very important that this person not judge your hurt, or justify your hurting through validating the actions of another person as “against” you.) Find that person. For me that person is my coach.

5. Sleep makes everything better. Being tired and hurting are a bad combination. There is perspective and understanding to be gained through proper rest. But only every time.

6. You’ll be stronger tomorrow than you feel today. In my most painful moments I have always remembered that tomorrow will not only be different, but better, as long as I don’t refuse the lesson the hurt provides me.

And always always remember, I’m here. I’m holding this space for you to feel all the feelings, loving you and believing in you and knowing that you are okay. Reply to this email if you need some personal encouragement and a reminder that you are simply experiencing a growth spurt.

Self-Trust Deficit

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Self-Trust DeficitI am never surprised to learn that my clients don’t trust themselves; they subconsciously (and sometimes consciously) see themselves as liars. Lacking self-trust is so common that I see it in virtually every setting in which I work. The internal gap between trust and doubt is created by not keeping commitments and agreements with yourself. Over time, the more promises you don’t keep with yourself, the bigger that gap becomes. Eventually, your ability to believe anything you tell yourself is so diminished, you might not even set or keep goals at all.

Weight loss — who are you kidding? I’ve tried every diet and can’t last a week.
Taking time off — I know it would be good for me, but I have too much to do and bills to pay, plus I’ll get time and a half if I volunteer for the holiday weekend.
Spending more time with the family — Look, I want my team to know how important they are and giving them 24/7 access to me is a way for me to stay connected to them and what’s going on with our customers. I don’t think my family suffers from a few text messages during dinner.
Cleaning out the garage — I’ll get around to it eventually; I know I’ve been saying I’d do it for a while now, but when I’m off work I deserve a break!

Spending any time at all rationalizing and justifying your reasons for not following through and keeping your agreements with yourself is a great indicator that your reserves are low. Feelings of failing, being incapable, inadequate, unfit, not as good as, not meeting expectations, and/or unmotivated are common when that store of self trust has been depleted.

Most Important Point:

Know that you are not your failure or your performance.

A Simple Way to Rebuild Your Low Supply

Identify something that excites you right now that would be fun for you to do.

Start small. And by small, I mean really small. Before rushing out to commit to any programs, books or memberships, commit for today — just one day.

For example, if you’ve always wanted to lose weight, but feel daunted by the scope of the task, don’t set a weight goal that with the best of coaches would take you a year to achieve.

Simply decide to take yourself for a walk today. And that’s it.

Can you tell yourself you’re going to walk today and then do it? You’ve kept an agreement with yourself.

You’re amazing!

Now take a mental snapshot, a time stamp if you will, of this moment in time when you decided and went for a walk. This way, the next time that voice of self doubt comes forward (like tomorrow, for example), you need only flip open your mental file and access the  experience of walking yesterday in such a way that it informs today’s decision. You can remind yourself that you can trust you. You now have proof that when you trust yourself and when you trust your choices, you create exactly what you want.

Rinse, lather and repeat that tomorrow and then again the day after tomorrow.

Every day you need only decide today to take yourself for a walk.

Do not set a goal farther away than one day.

Remember, this exercise is for anyone whose self-trust is low or non-existent. The objective is to build your trust to a place from which bigger and bigger commitments can be made and kept.

Consider the reasons you may be in the position you are currently: it’s due to the fact that in the past, commitments were made and not kept, some small, many large and over time those withdrawals created the current deficit.

Also note this works in any setting: personal or professional. Tasks and goals and dreams exist within us and want to be realized. The steps outlined above will get you to a different place of building yourself as a resource.

If you’d like some support on your journey, send me an email <coach@armindalindsay.com> and tell me your new goal for today and why you selected it. I’ll email something back to you that might be useful for you.

Loving you,
arminda

Happen it Now

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Happen It Now

During a recent conversation with my friend and colleague, Melissa Ford, we were discussing the inevitable changes that come with life. In my case, my daughter is graduating from high school this week and in August will be moving to another city to begin university. This life change brings with it many emotions and opportunities for personal growth and expansion.

My family includes myself, my (about to leave home for university) daughter, and our dog Eli. As we have been confronting these changes and watching copious amounts of the Gilmore Girls (but please no spoilers, we haven’t completed the original series yet), we are experiencing a range of emotions that run the gamut of excited and thrilled for what’s next to freaking out that it’s happening so fast and life is going to be so different and scary because of all the unknowns.

Normal.

For years I’ve been saying that when my daughter leaves for school my plan was to pack up and move myself somewhere else. Destination TBD.

Two days ago during a friendly conversation with a friend, I casually mentioned my intention to move later this year. When asked my timeline and whether I intended to sell my place, I gave my typical responses: Sometime after September and undecided.

“Well if you’re going to sell, summertime is probably the time to sell,” was all she said.

What a revelation. My denial tactics had abruptly come to an end. This was all happening whether I admitted it or not. My daughter is actually graduating high school. On Thursday! And she is, in fact, moving to another city that I will have to reach by plane when I want to see her. In August!

I really challenged myself — was I “all in” with my decision to make some changes in my own life, or have I just been saying that to avoid deciding what’s next for me? If I’m all in, as my friend and colleague Chris Dorris reminds us (reply to this email if you’d like his audio program on commitment), the next steps become apparent as you take them. You don’t need to think about it; you just do.

When I slowed myself down long enough to question my position, my mindset, I knew my truth: I’m all in. I am decided. I made a commitment to ME.

So if you’re in the neighborhood or know someone interested in a lovely well-kept home, mine’s officially on the market.

Here’s to summertime and saying yes.

Because if it’s happening anyway, why wait? Jump in. Happen it now and create the adventure as you go.

Loving you,
arminda

For Whom the Bell Tolls

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For Whom the Bell Tolls

My dog Eli is not food-motivated. (And until he joined our family we had no idea such a dog even existed!) This means we sometimes cajole, bribe, strongly encourage, throw impromptu dance parties, and sit beside of him to get him to eat or complete a meal. It also means that when Eli does finish the food in his bowl we celebrate BIG.

My dog is also an alarmist. A false one.

For reasons I have yet to understand, Eli often lies to me about having (not) eaten the food in his bowl. He comes to get me when there is still a lot of food left and the best I can do is remind him, again, to eat his food before he comes to tell me.

I want to celebrate him, to encourage and to recognize what for Eli is a huge accomplishment. And I know he loves our twice-daily ritualistic parties in his honor. Perhaps that’s why he comes to get me — hoping I won’t notice the still-full bowl so we can get on with the after-party.

Are there members of your team you’re constantly cajoling, bribing, strongly encouraging, dance partying and sitting beside just to get them to complete assignments and projects? Do you feel like you’re throwing massive parties in their honor just because they turned in a report on time?

Or am I describing YOU: Unmotivated, lacking enthusiasm, general ho-hum attitude about completing what’s been put in front of you? Are you waiting for someone else to throw you a dance party and notice what little, if any, progress you’ve made before you do anything else?

Eli doesn’t eat sometimes because he doesn’t want to eat. That’s it.

If you’ve got employees and team members who aren’t doing something, it’s because they don’t want to.

If you’re the one not completing a task you’ve either been given or that you assigned yourself, it’s because you don’t want to.

Motivation isn’t a thing; don’t get caught up in that misunderstanding.

I can no easier motivate my dog to eat his food, than I can motivate my daughter to clean her room, than I can motivate myself to balance my checkbook. If Eli doesn’t want to eat he won’t. If my daughter doesn’t want to clean her room, she won’t. And because I don’t want to balance my checkbook, I don’t; I pay my accountant to do it for me because he wants to do that sort of thing.

You can’t motivate anyone (yourself included) to do anything.

Dwight D. Eisenhower had it figured out when he said,

“Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.”

The “trick” that Eli understands is agreement. Our agreement is simple: when Eli finishes a meal, I agree to jump up and down, loudly declare his awesomeness and give him treats. Simple. When he doesn’t keep his part of the agreement (eating his food), I do not jump up and down or give him treats. (I do declare his awesomeness all the time; that can’t be helped.)

What agreements are you creating with your employees? What agreements are you creating with yourself? Are your employees in the right role? Are you leading in such a way that your team is accomplishing what you want because they want to do it?

While that food agreement is in place, it’s not until Eli decides to eat that he eats.

If you’re not feeling motivated to go to the gym, do you wait until you are? You’ll likely be waiting a long time to feel motivated. Some things just have to be decided. Don’t wait around to feel anything.

Decide and Do. Get motivated later.

loving you,
arminda

017: Chris Dorris & Emotional Mastery

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Chris Dorris

Chris Dorris & Emotional Mastery

The All Arminda Show

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Some of you may already be familiar with Chris Dorris. Not long ago I offered my readers access to his powerful audio program on commitment. If you missed that opportunity, it’s not too late. Just send me an email <coach@armindalindsay.com> and I’ll be happy to send you the link. It’s definitely worth the listen.

For those of you not familiar with him, Chris is essentially the psychological equivalent to a physical trainer and has been immersed in the world of pushing people past their perceived limits since 1994 in the capacity of advisor, consultant and Mental Toughness Trainer and Personal Transformation Coach to elite athletes, executives, entrepreneurs and individuals worldwide. He conducts workshops and seminars on Mental Conditioning, Leadership, and Peak Performance.

“Your life unfolds according to the way that you think.” — Buddha

What if you had a class that teaches you how to think and to strengthen the quality of your thinking skills? To practice using your mind to positively improve your world?

Was Freud wrong with his stimulus/response theory?!

The good news is you can IMMEDIATELY change your thoughts with CHOICE, and with practice we can alter our perceptions of reality. Suffering is merely the result of judging your sadness.

Your choice is to either experience the world problematically or opportunistically.

Options/interpretations of reality allow you to have, do and be what you want.

Chris’ Recommended Daily Practice

  1. Catch Your Negative Thoughts
  2. Own Your Thoughts
  3. Replace Your Interpretations With an Upgrade

Becoming aware of the invisible (inside) stuff is unconscious learning!

“If something is troubling you, it’s not the thing itself, but your estimate of it, which you can revoke at any time.” — Marcus Aurelius

Chris makes it very clear: He is not selling happy thoughts; he’s selling options — you have a choice.

You cannot create excellence and mastery in a sustainable way if you choose a low grade interpretation of reality. — Chris Dorris

“Create the state; don’t wait.” — Chris Dorris

Become the person who doesn’t have complaining be a thing that goes on in your life. Start stopping complaining.

Here’s the Louis Schwartzberg video on GRATITUDE:

You always have access to gratitude. The only thing that goes away is your ability to remember you always have access!

Maintain a gratitude journal.

We chat about our friend Andrew McKee and his amazing book titled Change Your Game, Change Your Life.

Love this interview? Please share it.

Loving you,
arminda

An Egoic Metaphor

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When I’m learning and expanding my world view, it’s not uncommon for me to experience discomfort alongside the learning. Typically that discomfort appears in the form of doubt, anxiety, frustration, a desire to quit, self distrust, fear of the future, or distractions.

The good news is none of that is the “real” YOU; it’s your ego. And your ego has a really loud voice so we have a tendency to pay attention to the loudest voice. . . until we train ourselves to listen to a different voice.

In this video I talk about the differences between those two voices in your head.

Your Essentials

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Your Essentials

Whether you’re going on an extended trip or just across the hall into the conference room for a presentation, make sure you’ve packed exactly what you need.

Your internal toolkit contains all your essentials:

  1. Personal Theme Song
  2. Laughter
  3. Signature Dance Moves
  4. Neutral Lenses
  5. Service Mindset
  6. Creative Outlook
  7. Love

#1 Personal Theme Song

Absolutely never ever leave home without this. You might have a different theme song for each day of the week, or for different experiences (making sales calls get one song, while presenting to your team has another). Stop whatever you’re doing right now and tell me your theme song!

#2 Laughter

Life is way too important to be taken seriously. Just ask my friends Steve & Jason of The Not So Serious Life; they regularly share their not serious opinions on all sorts of serious issues. And Bernie Glassman offers great advice in The Dude and the Zen Master:

“Let me give you a wonderful Zen practice. Wake up in the morning…look in the mirror, and laugh at yourself.”

#3 Signature Dance Moves

No one needs to see you. You don’t need to see you. Move. Just dance.

#4 Neutral Lenses

Remember that information is neutral until you assign meaning to it. See people and situations and experiences as if you’re gathering information; don’t interpret any of it too quickly.

#5 Serve

Serve at your earliest inconvenience. Serve from your heart. Serve without expectation of return. Serve because you love, not because you want. Your daughter asks you to play with her just as you’re on your way to a serious (see #2) business meeting? Drop and give her ten minutes.

Even after all this time,
The sun never says to the earth:
“You owe me!”

Look what happens with
A love like that!

It lights the whole sky!
— Hafiz

#6 Creative Outlook

What if you don’t know all the answers? HOORAY! What if the solution that worked last week no longer makes sense? HOORAY! What if you’ve been tasked with a seemingly-overwhelming project for which you feel completely unprepared? HOORAY! What if none of your hand-outs were printed and you don’t know it until five minutes before your presentation begins? HOORAY!

Given your situation, what would you like to create? 

#7 Love 

Robert Holden is my go-to guy on all things love-of-self-related. If you’ve not yet read his book Loveability, I recommend it immediately.

“Everyone we see is seen through the filter of our self-awareness. Therefore, how we see ourselves — loveable or unloveable — influences what we see in others.”

Love isn’t on your packing list as optional; it’s the one thing to be sure you grab if you run out of time and nothing else gets into your bag. Love is the essential.

Let me know if you’re unsure where it’s located or why it’s so important.

Loving you,
arminda

allarminda.com | 2024