“It is really like a game – you’ve gotta know the rules of the game, and it takes a while to learn those rules – once you know the rules, you’ve gotta play, you can’t just watch, you can’t just sit on the side and be a spectator and comment – you’ve got to get your hands dirty and start playing…”

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My post yesterday, where I talked about Shadow Artists was, of course, only one version of ‘my story’ – a story of struggle and what was missing. The way we tell our personal stories – to others and to ourselves – has a great impact on how we go forward in our lives; whether that story is empowering or whether it keeps us stuck in an endless loop, doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over.

Are you doing what you love? Something that you’ve dreamed of doing? longed for?

Or are you doing something close – in the same industry but a different role, in a field which gets near to, but isn’t actually what you’d like to have done?

How close are you to the Big Hairy Audacious thing you’d LOVE to be doing? (not necessarily the thing you think you can do or should do)

Are you indeed a shadow xxxxx?
(insert your dream you eg. artist, photographer, actor, surgeon, politician, journalist…)

Hoorah, I posted my first little YouTube/Blip.tv extravaganza today – a clip from the interview I did with the fab Brian Johnson from Philosophers Notes – sooo much fun – thanks Bri!! combined with a whirlwhind visual overview of all 100 titles…

and for fun, here’s a question for you!!

It’s day 27 of the Prosperity Experiment and I just couldn’t help it spilling over into this blog . The exercise today is to let yourself free on a Rampage of Appreciation. Just let it all out – all the things you’re grateful for, all that you love, everything that gives you joy or make you feel bliss…. HAVE FUN with it!!! Enjoy. Once you get going, who knows if you’ll be able to stop… Here’s a wonderful example in motion of such a Rampage:

This week I’ve joined Mary Jaksch’s Virtual Zen Retreat: How to Turn Anxiety into Inspiration. What a beautiful course – thank-you Mary, Deb, and Miraz… I’ll be talking to Mary later this month about her work in the Personal Journeys series of interviews here, so watch this space.

In today’s Zen post, Mary shared this video by Alan Watts, filmed over 10 years ago talking about Work as Play, spontaneity, pleasure, Hindu philosophy, the atomic bomb, Dante and enjoying our lives. It’s so NOT like the 15 second attention span, hi-speed, blip-verts that we’re so accustomed to watching these days… change gear for a few minutes and maybe be inspired – he even sings at one point – magical!

It’s the last few days of the long school summer holiday here in Spain (12 whole weeks!) and I’ve been reflecting on how we’ve used our time together. Did we mainly use this gift or squander it?

Well, much of it was spent muddling along, trying to forge a home-based ‘routine’ that allowed David and I to both continue working, without depriving the boys (aged 4 and 6) from having us there with them and joining in with their time out. At the beginning, this felt like an almost impossible challenge – I mean 12 weeks!!

“Ha ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha! Do you like my evil laugh?” (from me to Hugh MacLeod on Facebook)

I’ve been playing games all this week. Well, no, when I haven’t been coping with our poorest cash flow week this year, and working until 2 or 3am every night, I’ve been playing games. It’s funny how life manifests in extremes sometimes.

“recognise that it is a struggle… it’s not an easy task for most of us… its actually something you need to work at through self-knowledge and through courage… stick with it as much as you can, because the only way forward is to move forward…”

Are you doing Great Work? not just good work, but really Great Work? Michael Bungay Stanier asks the bigger questions and helps people focus on doing the work that has meaning and will make a difference. With his company, Box of Crayons, he’s created numerous practical tools to help others find their purpose and ’stop the busywork and start the work that matters’, including books, workshops programs and some inspirational Flash movies (links below).

It’s been one of those weeks where the subject of money has come up time and time again in my own personal life and in the lives of just about everyone I’ve spoken to it seems. There’s a general sense of there not being enough to go round… it all seems a bit serious and fraught and not much fun at all.

Smile and the world smiles with you, but laugh in the wrong place or in the wrong context and the world may just get a little upset.

This week I’ve upset TheO, our four year old son, twice by making this error ‘it’s not funny mama!’ he said as I laughed when he did something cute, and off he went, all upset and cross, thinking that I was laughing at him, rather than what I thought I was doing, which was laughing with the pure pleasure of watching a child do things their own way. Laughter of Delight, I’d call it.