Get a Life UK

This afternoon I was reminded of  a lovely lady I once worked with whilst I was still back in my corporate career, working as an area manager in a well known high street bank.

This inspiring lady came to mind as a result of a rather frustrating technical hitch between myself and my computer!
(Taking my own advice I turned my frustration into fascination, hence I stopped what I was doing and wrote this blog entry instead!)
 
I recall a similarly frustrating day whilst still working for the bank, luckily for me, that particular day I arrived for an afternoon meeting with this calm and wonderful woman. She was a wise and gentle woman, I seem to remember she was in the Salvation army outside of her "Day job" I know she gave many hours of her time to help people less fortunate than herself. She was thoughtful, loving and kind, I really enjoyed working alongside her ( despite her particular job being an auditing type role!)

Anyway, It must have been quite obvious that I had, had a very frustratng morning, but she simply smiled and put the kettle on!

Whilst she made the tea I noticed a black and white photocopy pinned to her notice board. It was a picture of a Salmon, with the phrase "Don't be a salmon" typed above it.

 A couple of minutes later, she handed me my very welcome cup of tea, thanking her, I enquired ; now intruiged, what the picture  and phrase meant.

She explained that in life we can either go with the flow or against it..... If we flow with life, then its a beautiful journey, calm,supported, and in simple terms its just moves along more easily.
 
However, if we choose to swim against the flow, its hard work, tiring, frustrating, limiting and we use up so much energy just trying to keep up the fight against the current, we simply don't get to enjoy the journey.

I paused to think about this..... She then went on to say (Which I didn't realise at the time) that the Salmon risks life and fin (excuse the pun) to swim  upstream to sporn its eggs, it battles against the flow, its a hard and tiring journey......eventually the Salmon, exhausted from its journey, reaches the end of its swim and  sporns its eggs.... the Salmon will then usually die within the next seven days.

Whilst this is the ultimate sacrifice to reproduce......The photocopied piece of paper of course then made perfect sense to me..... It was a reminder......
 
"Don't be a Salmon!" ... don't spend your life and your journey, constantly swimming against the flow of life...... to then come to the end and to have struggled throughout and not savoured the beautiful scenery along the way!

So,this afternoon,when my  computer hitch made me feel frustrated and as though I was efforting and getting no where... I remembered the Salmon!

I immedeately stopped what I was doing, made a cup of tea, took some deep breaths and got back into the flow!
 
Re-energised... back in the flow and inspired to share this blog post with you!

So, I urge you today to consider:

Where are you efforting , but smply treading water?
Where are you swimming against the tide?
What would you need to change for you to get back into the flow?
What action can you take right now, that will allow flow into your life and work?

Let go and let flow !
Until next time,
Make every moment count!
Lisa xxx