Welcome to 2010 & the 1st edition of Facets 

February 2010 - Create your year with intention

This is the beginning of a new chapter in the life of Jo-Anne Hook Solutions. My newsletter, Facets, gives me a wonderful opportunity to stay in touch and share interesting information and strategies with you throughout the coming year.

After 18 years in business,  I now have a web site -    

www.johooksolutions.com.au

The natural flow on from that was to offer subscribers a way to connect on a regular basis. Hence Facets was born.

I look forward to sharing with you the many insights that come from my life and work both in Business and Life coaching. So please make yourself a cup of something soothing and allow 5 minutes to sit and ponder the many facets of your life and hopefully learn how to enjoy it even more. 

Hint of the month 

Imagine the life of your dreams....now.

I hope the new year and decade has started well for you and that you have a clear sense of how you'd like the year to unfold.  Have you written your goals, created a Vision Board or dared to at least dream about the life you want to create?

Get into ACTION - This is the perfect time to set your goals and intentions for the priority areas of your life and to act on those intentions in some physical way instead of just thinking or talking. That's the point!  Many people don't realise that taking the first step can be as simple as putting pen to paper or cutting and pasting images ( on your computer Vision Board) or on a piece of cardboard or canvas. It's the simplest form of 'getting into ACTION!' Imagine if you wanted to build your ideal home and didn't ever commit the idea to paper or sign the contract? Somehow, the act of writing, drawing or creating a model helps in the creative process; it helps you to commit. It also allows you to clarify your thoughts and to share them with others if you wish. So...before you read another paragraph, please grab a pen and write something that you'd like to achieve or experience in each of the areas listed below.

 

  • Relationships
  • Health & wellbeing
  • Career
  • Fun
  • Family
  • Education
  • Financial Health
  • Self care / Spiritual

Done. How good does it feel to have started?

What's important about it?
Now...next to each of your goals or intentions write a simple statement or word that says why it's important to you to achieve or experience this. Unless your goals and aspirations are in line with your values and relate to a greater vision of your life they're unlikely to be achieved. When you answer - 'what's important about doing this?' you connect with that greater purpose.

As an example you may have written -

Relationship Goal:

To go on a date with my partner each month starting February 14th.

Why it's important? 

I want to maintain the romance and strong connection we have so our relationship and our communication gets better and better. This could be important because you want your kids to grow up experiencing what the qualities of a good relationship are.  Or so that you can work through issues that come up more easily because you have taken the time to develop good lines of communication.
As you'll notice, it's the 'what's important' question that gives you the real thing you're going after.

In my experience if you keep asking the question, digging deeper and deeper, you eventually come to the core reason and that's the highest motivator to act.  It may be something like this- The most important reason to go for this goal is because I want to be a role model for my kids and others. If they experience  a truly supportive home life they will know how to provide one to their kids one day and the pattern can be repeated each generation. We can have a positive effect on our family, our extended family and our community by being a good example.

So next time you decide to go for some 'thing' ask yourself what matters most about having it?

*For more insights into setting goals for life I recommend Stephen Covey's books - First things First
or The Seven Habits of Highly successful people.


Upcoming Events.

INTUITION workshop - a day to power up your internal wisdom 

The first workshop for the year is booked for February 21st and I really hope that you'll come along. It's an opportunity to learn more about how Intuition works and more importantly, how 'yours' works. This workshop came about as a direct result of an experience I had last year. I was enveloped in an intensely stressful family situation and it was an intuitive insight that helped turn things around. The experience was so profound that I felt compelled to investigate this 'natural' wisdom and to encourage others to trust in it. My curiosity and training in NLP took my investigation to a new level.

There's some amazing information available on this topic, which is often referred to as the secret success mechanism of business greats such as Bill Gates of Microsoft, Steve Jobs of Apple, Richard Branson and Oprah Winfrey. Brilliant people like Albert Einstein, who helped shaped our understanding of the Universe, attributed his greatest findings to his highly developed intuition. In fact when you think about it, no new discoveries would ever have been made without someone having an intuitive thought that they then acted upon.

Intuitive thinking can be practiced and mastered in all areas of your life. It can improve your decision making in relationships, your career, your health and your finances. It's different to rational thinking and may be a worthwhile compliment to those who 'over analyse' things and find themselves paralysed by indecision. For others it comes easily and this day will allow them to develop it further so that they can trust it more completely.
The day will have a balance of comprehensive information and time for profound Self Mastery.

Bookings or enquiries: www.johooksolutions.com.au for flyer or call me (03) 9419 5508

Quotes to inspire:

"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift." - Albert Einstein

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary." - Steve Jobs founder Apple computers; Pixar and NeXT.

 

Book Recommendations:

Blink - the power of thinking without thinking  by Malcolm Gladwell (author of The Tipping Point)

'An art expert sees a ten-million-dollar sculpture and instantly spots it's a fake. A marriage analyst knows within minutes whether a couple will stay together.
'This book is all about those moments when we 'know' something without knowing why.'
A great read for insights that are helpful in both personal and professional settings. Especially interesting was the section on studies of why some Doctors are sued and why others are not. Also insightful research and handy hints to easily recognise when a couple is destined to stay together and the signs that they may not.

Eat...Pray ...Love - one woman's search for everything  by Elizabeth Gilbert

Faced with realising that all she thought she wanted was no longer 'right' for her Elizabeth has a 'melt down' on her bathroom floor and decides to leave her husband and go in search of who she really is.
Although this sounds like a classic book for women I believe it gives a generous insight into how many woman think and behave at turning points in their lives and may well be helpful to any men trying to gain insights into the weird and wacky ways of women. Travel with the author on her soul searching adventure as she lives in Rome for 4 months, India for 4 months and finally in Bali for 4 months.


Last word -

What would you do or say right now if you knew that today was the last day of your life? 
What are you waiting for?