“52 Ways for Entrepreneurs to Thrive” – The List Begins…

people-jumping-sunset.jpgI love to say, ”thriving” when someone asks me how my business is going. The notion that things are flourishing, blooming, and prosperous fills me with delight. Likewise, I like to use the same word to describe my health and wellness. “Thriving” seems to capture that top-of-the-world feeling I strive for each day. So when I read the post on Angeles Arrien’s website this past spring, 50 Ways to Thrive and Survive in the Next Ten Years, you bet it caught my attention.

I chose a few items from the list and implemented them that week. I gave something away, talked to a neighbor, and explored a new walking trail. Doing so truly added to my feelings of wellness and “thriving.”

I’d like to co-create a similar list for entrepreneurs in the WellnessCoach.com community. I’d love you to join me in building the list. Tell me the ways that you increase your sense of wellness and help yourself thrive as an entrepreneur.

Let’s shoot for 52 ways to thrive – that could cover a year’s worth of weekly focal points. I’ll start:

52 Ways for Entrepreneurs to Thrive (The list begins…)

• Put plants in your office, water them often
• Pack your lunch at night; Take it to a nearby park the next day
• Set a kitchen timer to remind you to stand and stretch each hour
• Go barefoot in your office
• Ask for help 3 times this week
• Start a blog
• Visit a toy store at lunch; find something that makes you smile
• Hold a board of directors meeting on a conference line with a few colleagues. Ask them to brainstorm with you on a topic that’s been baffling you
• Expand your community – post to a blog at least once this week
• Write a haiku on your lunch hour
• Take a lunch hour
• Put cucumber slices into a pitcher of water; drink throughout the day
• Give a business book away to someone who might need it
• Breathe. Breathe deeply. Just breathe.
• Revisit your corporate mission and vision; rewrite so it makes you smile and tugs at your heart strings

What will you add to this list?

Stillpoints for Your Entrepreneurial Wellbeing

stones-leaf.jpgAre you familiar with the term Stillpoint? It’s often mentioned when discussing forms of body work, including: Osteopathy, Balanced Integrative Therapy, CranioSacral Therapy, and deep tissue massage. The Stillpoint is a phenomenon that occurs during the treatment.

A simple description of the Stillpoint is: the moment (usually toward the last part of a treatment) that the client’s previously active body energy or body rhythm, stops — either on its own or through conscious intent of the practitioner to stop the active rhythm — so the body can reintegrate and assimilate the changes that are being made.

Having experienced many forms of body work, I can tell you that the moment of the Stillpoint is not just palpable by the practitioner, but by the client as well. And whether you have had formal bodywork sessions or not, I know you know this place within you.

Perhaps you experience your personal Stillpoint when you meditate. Maybe you notice it when gazing at a candle, a sunset, your peacefully sleeping children, or while you’re painting, or digging in your garden. I find mine when I meditate, swim or hang out with horses. The Stillpoint moments of life are luscious. Making them a regular part of our wellness programs will renew our busy entrepreneurial spirits.

Manya Arond-Thomas, M.D., a brilliant consultant, (and fortunately for me, a B/Coach colleague of mine from days gone by), wrote a fabulous article back in 2004 called: “The Power of the StillPoint. No matter how much time goes by, reading her article helps me find my own Stillpoint. May it help you do the same.