In one of the worst times of my life, I felt like I was completely lost. I had a hard time channeling my thoughts, keeping on track and looking ahead. One thing that I knew that would help me get outside of myself, re-adjust and get back on track was to help others by volunteering: how could I possibly not feel compelled to get up and get moving with a sense of purpose and urgency, when I was doing whatever needed to be done on someone else's behalf? It was the best decision that I could make at a time like that.
With my ever-present gravitation towards animals, the natural choice was to start volunteering at a local animal shelter. I was nervous making that first call to inquire and then attend volunteer orientation, but from there it became much easier. It was hard work - heart-breaking at times, propelling at other times but always gratifying. Seeing wagging tails, smiling faces and being in the midst of others who shared my passion was motivating and helped me keep my sense purpose. I had the opportunity to learn about other people who I volunteered alongside - another plus. I understood that we all had two things in common: we were human beings, and had a passion for helping animals. Some had outside labels like stay-at-home mom, postal worker, vet tech student, retiree, CEO of a large company, out-of-work secretary, attorney, high school student, carpenter, fellow small business owner. The former was the only important thing, and the sense of being needed for those few short hours per week was like a refuge, I think. Even if one didn't feel terribly motivated or useful during the time that we spent outside of volunteering, we certainly felt needed and valued when we were there.
There are great ways for folks to offer their time and talents for the benefit of others. Websites like VolunteerMatch and Points of Light are great resources for getting information on volunteering. Locally, in Washtenaw County, there is a way to discover groups that are a fit - volunteerwashtenaw.com - a database of sorts that helps one search for great opportunites.
Volunteering one's time is a great way to do so much for others. It gives people a chance to be their best: they see that they are useful, valued, capable - and in turn they go further and continue to be motivated.
I think that quite often, the biggest obstacle that we face collectively in life is ourselves. We get in our own way, think too much about ourselves and when that's the case, it's easy to get lagged down. Thinking about others, well, there's just no room for that.
Lorrie Shaw is a professional pet sitter, regular pets contributor to annarbor.com and pet blogger in Dexter Twp, MI. She participates in Motivated Mondays along with writer, speaker, mountain bike rider and author of Backroads & Byways Of Arizona, Jackie Dishner. #MotivatedMondays on Twitter is a culmination of inspirational notes, blogs and tips to help motivate and get other ready for each week after the weekend lull - or anytime.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Monday, September 6, 2010
A peanut butter/chocolate kind of thing
Liz Strauss had a great blog post earlier and I wanted to share it, because it really resonated with me. In fact, I feel like it relates to a concept that I discussed on AnnArbor.com this past week. A total "your peanut butter and my chocolate" kind of thing.
Liz talks about being passionate, connected, and making things seamless with work and the personal side of one's life. I talk about living vicariously through the pets in our lives and how it teaches us to "be". In doing so, I stay connected to what is important, stay joyful and motivated, because I know that these pets depend on me, too.
Liz's post really fits with staying motivated, I think. too.
Thoughts?
Lorrie Shaw is a professional pet sitter, regular pets contributor to annarbor.com and pet blogger in Dexter Twp, MI. She participates in Motivated Mondays along with writer, speaker, mountain bike rider and author of Backroads & Byways Of Arizona, Jackie Dishner. #MotivatedMondays on Twitter is a culmination of inspirational notes, blogs and tips to help motivate and get other ready for each week after the weekend lull - or anytime.
Liz talks about being passionate, connected, and making things seamless with work and the personal side of one's life. I talk about living vicariously through the pets in our lives and how it teaches us to "be". In doing so, I stay connected to what is important, stay joyful and motivated, because I know that these pets depend on me, too.
Liz's post really fits with staying motivated, I think. too.
Thoughts?
Lorrie Shaw is a professional pet sitter, regular pets contributor to annarbor.com and pet blogger in Dexter Twp, MI. She participates in Motivated Mondays along with writer, speaker, mountain bike rider and author of Backroads & Byways Of Arizona, Jackie Dishner. #MotivatedMondays on Twitter is a culmination of inspirational notes, blogs and tips to help motivate and get other ready for each week after the weekend lull - or anytime.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Keeping up with the Joneses: How your claiming your definition of success helps to shape your mindset, and stay motivated
"Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” - Winston Churchill
Years ago, I started dealing with a network marketing company to try and make a little extra money and diversify my time. The company offered different types of support as far as building a business - their way. A lot of what they taught was invaluable, with training from internationally-known motivational speakers and business-types, seminars, instrinsic product knowledge education - that kind of stuff. I still find it valuable, although I don't do as much with the company anymore. What I didn't like, and what I see with a lot of other companies of all kinds: the feeling that the current level of success that you've attained is not-up-to-par, that they are making you who you are, that some of the tactics that they employ to convey to you how to get clients and "build relationships" are less than desirable, that you can be more - but that you need to adhere to their way of approaching/talking to people (sometimes using methods that are beyond my level of comfort - for good reason). I could go on, but I won't.
I learned a lot from being in business for myself 9 years prior to that, and had done pretty well for myself. Some of what the company "taught" made me squirm, and rightfully so. Much of it went against common sense and real relationship building - both concepts that are extremely important to me.
One thing that I really felt icky about was that my "upline" and the trainings of other uplines focused on the idea that one needed to increase their success - and "success" was defined by sales and recruiting (and making other people money) and far less about creating bonds with people in a genuine way, finding solutions for them by pairing them with products that fit their needs and their budget in a way that they felt comfortable with (I mean, literally bullying folks into making a purchase? Please. So not me.) My gut said: "No, no, no..." How can people sleep at night doing that?
I've never let anyone else define my idea - or better yet, my concept of what success is. Not when I started my cleaning service, not during my time that I was active with the company and not when I started my pet sitting service. Don't get me wrong - people attempted to, and still do. ("You should hire people to do the work for you!" "Join our networking group; it'll help your business grow." "You know, you could make a lot more money if you...")
*sigh*
I know what my recipe for success is. The core remains the same, first and foremost, providing capable care for pets while their families are away - but some of the peripheral needs of the business and my personal life cause me to adjust what areas I need to focus in.
It really seems as though so many people are comparing themselves to what other people are doing so much so, that they have either lost sight of what their concept of success is - or they've never been able to define it for themselves at all. Sad, isn't it? It happens in the corporate world, in the land of the self-employed, and equally in people's personal lives. And, it really screws things up.
Most of all, I find that many times it actually decreases motivation because you start to question yourself too much about what your process is; dumbing it down. Second-guessing is a real motivation stealer.
So my questions for you are: What is success? How do you define it? What is your recipe for staying motivated to achieve your successes in life? Are you trying to keep up wth the Joneses to hammer out someone else's standard of success?
Lorrie Shaw is a professional pet sitter, regular pets contributor to annarbor.com and pet blogger in Dexter Twp, MI. She participates in Motivated Mondays along with writer, speaker, mountain bike rider and author of Backroads & Byways Of Arizona, Jackie Dishner. #MotivatedMondays on Twitter is a culmination of inspirational notes, blogs and tips to help motivate and get other ready for each week after the weekend lull - or anytime.
Years ago, I started dealing with a network marketing company to try and make a little extra money and diversify my time. The company offered different types of support as far as building a business - their way. A lot of what they taught was invaluable, with training from internationally-known motivational speakers and business-types, seminars, instrinsic product knowledge education - that kind of stuff. I still find it valuable, although I don't do as much with the company anymore. What I didn't like, and what I see with a lot of other companies of all kinds: the feeling that the current level of success that you've attained is not-up-to-par, that they are making you who you are, that some of the tactics that they employ to convey to you how to get clients and "build relationships" are less than desirable, that you can be more - but that you need to adhere to their way of approaching/talking to people (sometimes using methods that are beyond my level of comfort - for good reason). I could go on, but I won't.
 |
| flickr photo courtesy of Josh Janssen |
I learned a lot from being in business for myself 9 years prior to that, and had done pretty well for myself. Some of what the company "taught" made me squirm, and rightfully so. Much of it went against common sense and real relationship building - both concepts that are extremely important to me.
One thing that I really felt icky about was that my "upline" and the trainings of other uplines focused on the idea that one needed to increase their success - and "success" was defined by sales and recruiting (and making other people money) and far less about creating bonds with people in a genuine way, finding solutions for them by pairing them with products that fit their needs and their budget in a way that they felt comfortable with (I mean, literally bullying folks into making a purchase? Please. So not me.) My gut said: "No, no, no..." How can people sleep at night doing that?
I've never let anyone else define my idea - or better yet, my concept of what success is. Not when I started my cleaning service, not during my time that I was active with the company and not when I started my pet sitting service. Don't get me wrong - people attempted to, and still do. ("You should hire people to do the work for you!" "Join our networking group; it'll help your business grow." "You know, you could make a lot more money if you...")
*sigh*
I know what my recipe for success is. The core remains the same, first and foremost, providing capable care for pets while their families are away - but some of the peripheral needs of the business and my personal life cause me to adjust what areas I need to focus in.
 |
| flickr photo courtesy of greeblie |
Most of all, I find that many times it actually decreases motivation because you start to question yourself too much about what your process is; dumbing it down. Second-guessing is a real motivation stealer.
So my questions for you are: What is success? How do you define it? What is your recipe for staying motivated to achieve your successes in life? Are you trying to keep up wth the Joneses to hammer out someone else's standard of success?
Lorrie Shaw is a professional pet sitter, regular pets contributor to annarbor.com and pet blogger in Dexter Twp, MI. She participates in Motivated Mondays along with writer, speaker, mountain bike rider and author of Backroads & Byways Of Arizona, Jackie Dishner. #MotivatedMondays on Twitter is a culmination of inspirational notes, blogs and tips to help motivate and get other ready for each week after the weekend lull - or anytime.
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