Pay Careful Attention – Your Life Depends on it!

You know this already, but today is my day to remind you.

Your attention span is finite.

You are allowed to choose what you pay attention to… but you probably don’t exercise that choice as much as you want to, or need to.

You can spend all day paying attention to your normal routine, your computer screen, your aching knee, or your plans to spend money (often disguised as the next exciting thing in your life). Or you can spend your day creating a more interesting route, taking the chance to look out of the window, finding a new way to stretch and move your aching knee, or exploring life beyond the constraints of what money can buy.

Some forms of attention are mutually exclusive:

You cannot appreciate your wellbeing while focussing on your poor health.

You cannot be creative while doing what everyone else does.

You cannot be true to yourself while betraying someone else.

You cannot enjoy your wealth while worrying about your poverty.

You cannot be at peace when you are waging war.

You cannot enjoy now while planning what’s next.

You cannot learn until you are willing to now know.

You cannot love yourself while you are hating others.

You cannot win if you are not prepared to lose.

You cannot be unless you are prepared to not do.

The things we focus on and which claim our attention are the most important indicator of the life we experience. It really is that simple.

Nothing else has to change – just the things that we let our mind settle on.

What will you wear in 2012?

Of all the Christmas presents that changed hands this year in our house this one, given by our daughter to my husband made me chuckle the most. Especially when he proudly proceeded to wear it on Boxing Day, braving ridicule and making us all smile. Though of course, to me, he is perfect

And it sparked my closing thought for 2011 and my opener for 2012.

What will your T-shirt promote in the coming year?

• Yourself?
• Your company?
• Your big idea?
• Your new invention?
• Your favourite brand?
• Your local team?
• The charity you support?
• Your gym or sports club?
• Your favourite quote?

My suggestion is that you find an idea, an organisation, or a person that means a lot to you and you commit to wear their T-shirt – metaphorically at least. Put as much of your effort as you can in 2012 in that direction. The more central that concept is in your life, and the more you focus on it, the happier you will be. If it’s your own business you’re on to a winner; if it’s the company you work for, fantastic. If it’s a charity – good for you. A picture of your family – yes! Your football team… not bad.

You can flip the idea too. If you wouldn’t be seen dead in your company’s T-shirt ask yourself why. Is it time for a change? Time to follow your dream and make 2012 the year you find out who you really are? And if your idea of a good T-shirt is to advertise someone else’s name for them, ask yourself if you might not be better off polishing up your own brand and making more of your life.

Too often, our New Year’s resolve  simply scratches the surface of our lives – we might think we’re challenging ourselves but it’s easy to target superficial things without getting to the root of the issue. Losing weight, giving up smoking, exercising more, being punctual – they’re all great resolutions. But once you’ve found a purpose – a good cause – something that deserves your energy – you’ll be so excited about life that looking after yourself will become second nature.

In the end, the best thing that can happen to you in 2012 is to become even more excited about your life.

Which reminds me of my favourite quote:

“Don’t ask what the world needs, ask what makes you come alive and go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

That would look good on a T-shirt…

This is the beginning of a new society

My first career (said in the same tone as one talks of one’s first husband) was in money. I was a financial adviser, working as a dealer when the Big Bang happened and when Black Monday blew us away – along with the Great Storm – in 1987.

From selling investments I moved into marketing investments for blue-chip companies, working on the team which launched the first ever unit-trust personal pension in the UK, and I helped Royal and Sun Alliance design a ground-breaking award-winning employee pension scheme.

So I know a bit about financial services and how to spot a good punt.

I don’t talk about this aspect of my life much because I became very disillusioned. I realised that, instead of financially empowering customers, most financial institutions were hell-bent on financially empowering themselves first. I left the industry to do something that felt more worthwhile.

But I want to tell you about someone who took a different approach. While I was busy walking away and getting all new-age, Jason Scott was summoning up his courage to take on the big boys. He was deeply saddened as he watched good people lose their hope and homes to bad money practices. He was angry. And he decided to do something about it.

That ‘something’ is Civilised Money. It’s a new, alternative way of banking based on crowd funding. It’s designed to enrich EVERYONE who takes part. A totally transparent finance initiative, it takes a sustainable and responsible approach to money. It’s fair and it’s ethical, but most of all its empowering. Not surprisingly the management team are a bunch of super-enlightened bods from a mix of relevant backgrounds including my favourite guru and authentic business leader, Neil Crofts.

This project has been years in the making: against the background of all the disappointment and rage and powerlessness we have all been feeling over the last decade as we see our economy plundered, our standard of living plummet, the gap between rich and poor soar into hyperspace and our children’s futures looking financially precarious;  as we have watched the financially unthinkable happen in the hands of the commercially uncontrollable, and experienced the reality of our powerlessness in the democracy we live in; while all this has been happening Jason has been busy dreaming and designing and creating and launching a whole new banking paradigm.

It launched this week. You have a once-only chance to get in on the ground floor. They are offering 10% of the equity in the company and anyone can invest. You have 7 more days to get in on the act and you can invest as little as a tenner. And you can pay with Paypal. So there’s nothing complicated at all.

If enough of us get behind this idea we will have an alternative way of funding and being funded, investing and getting investment, lending and borrowing. I’m not going to write any more words telling you how it all works. But I will just say that I believe it has the potential to move us into a new level of consciousness around money and why we need it and how we want it to improve our lives. And that’s got to be a good thing. Hasn’t it?

Of course, if you’re happy with the way the banking and financial services industry is running the country and controlling the government then you can just close your browser and get on with your life.

But if you do feel like that, I’d just like to remind you of one of my favourite pieces of graffiti. It’s on the top left.

Don’t forget – you can invest from £10 upwards. But hurry… there are only 7 more shopping days to go and this is going viral.