Are you under pressure to get things done?

Do you feel stressed about meeting all of your deadlines on time? Are you juggling multiple priorities and afraid you might drop one of the balls?

I was rushing around last week in this sort of mindset, thinking that if I just moved faster I would have more time and get ahead of the tension and stress I was feeling.

Then I almost ran over a snake with my car and this made me stop.

I had pulled off into a residential neighborhood – cutting across town to get around freeway traffic. I was speeding along, thinking about all of the things I needed to get done in the next hour when I turned a corner and there in the middle of the street, coiled up with its head waving in the air was a snake.

Because I was driving impatiently and thinking ahead to what I need to do – my reaction was slow. I barely had time to maneuver my wheels to miss flattening the snake with my tires.

Sure, a 25 inch snake is not something you expect to see miles from any park in a concrete-and-asphalt neighborhood in downtown Oakland. I’m sure I could have made excuses for accidentally killing this random snake in a city street.

But the reality was that I was in rush mode and distracted – not caring much about where I was – just focused on where I was going.

The slow-moving snake was an instant reminder of how our rushing is more often harmful than helpful.

What are we rushing for? A few extra minutes? And what gets run over or killed in the process? Is the cost of our rushing worth the effects on our bodies, minds, health and relationships?

What matters more – our deadlines or being conscious and considerate of life?

This is our last post in the five week Time series. So far we have four tools for helping us know abundance in time:

Tool #1: Let the time we have be enough

Tool #2: Ability to shift our perception of time

Tool #3: Value the process as much as the goal

Tool #4: Give up (the illusion of) control

This week we head into the territory of Now, where everything takes place. Our thoughts, feelings, experiences and conversations, our planning for the future and our analysis of the past – our whole lives are lived here – in the Now. 

Now is where we feel busy and stressed, where we experience lack of time and the frustration of not being able to accomplish everything we want to. Now is where we rush to get ahead and multi-task to save time.

This then is the most important place to learn to know abundance in time. Here, Now, where everything happens.

Our tool here, Now, is choice.

We choose how we view time. We choose what we do. We choose how busy we are. We choose to rush. We choose how to think about something. We choose how to respond.

The complicated web of our daily lives is made up of choices.

I know, sometimes it seems like we have no choice. We have meetings to attend, phone calls and emails to return, bills to pay, deadlines to meet. Our lives are dictated by what we have to do and we scramble for “free” time to fit in what we love to do. We don’t see options, we have to do these things.

But why? Why do we have to do these things? Because for whatever reason (and reasons vary for each person, family, organization, business, religion, culture, country) we have decided that we need to, that we have to, do what we are doing. We make this choice.

Of course there are many things that happen that we do not choose, that we would not choose. Our lives are impacted by choices that other people make or by natural forces or events that we can’t control or change.

We loose our job or our house, our largest donor stops giving because of stock market declines, our dog dies, or our sister develops cancer.

These things and others are happening and we did not choose them.

We can’t control what is happening but we can choose how we perceive, how we think about, how we respond to, and how we participate in, what is happening.

We do have, in every moment, in every situation, this choice.

Choice is our most powerful tool for knowing abundance in time.

How we view time is one of the choices we make.

Can you see how your choices – in your thinking, in your beliefs or opinions, in your actions and responses – creates your Now?

What are you choosing?

(This post is #5 in a 5 part series on Time)

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p.s. The tool of choice is about your choice. This is not an exercise in sitting back and judging other people’s choices or saying that your choices are better than someone else’s choices.

You already know from your own experience that sometimes it is hard to see choice when you are in the midst of something. We all do the best we can with what we have, with where we are and with what we know.

Happy Monday!

There is another guaranteed way to discover abundance in time: let go of trying to control what happens.

This is a hard one because our daily lives center around creating order to reach goals and to manage and respond to what is happening with our selves (body, mind, emotions), with each other (same list) and in our environments (natural, social, work, economic.)

Control is a tool that has served us our whole lives:

• Control is how we face the unknown.
• Control gives us a sense of security and assures us that we are in charge of everything that it is possible to be in charge of.
• Control is power to make things happen.
• Control is a way to get people to do what we want.
• Control helps us eliminate undesirable factors and predict and prepare for the future.
• Control enables us to manage what is happening – so that things don’t get out of control.

Control is such a useful behavior, why would we want to let go of it?

Because contrary to our belief – control actually limits our ability to freely live our lives, to creatively respond to what is happening and to relax, to be stress free, to know abundance in time.

Our desire for control causes sickness and tension in our body, anxiety, shortness of breath and stress in ourselves and in those around us.

Why are we so busy – why is there not enough time? Often it is because we are trying to manage and control things that are not within our ability to manage and control.

What are the things that you try to control? How does this impact your life, your relationships, your health and your perspective of time?

We all have our own idea of what should happen. And we carry these ideas into every interaction, every situation. This habit often leads to frustration when people around us and/or what is happening in our environment does not fit into our timeline or behave the way we want them/it to.

Letting go of control doesn’t mean that you don’t plan or have goals – it just means that you don’t become rigid in your plans or in your mindset. As soon as control sets in you shut yourself off from the infinite possibilities that are alive in each moment.

When you try to control what happens, you narrow the possibilities to only what you can conceive – to only what you think matters and what is important to you.

What often happens in planning ahead or in trying to predict the unknown is that our idea of what might happen or what we want to happen becomes our only view.  Our idea becomes what should happen – what must happen.  And here is where our desire to control steps in and becomes a trap.

Letting go of control doesn’t mean you don’t act or respond. It simply means you remain open in every situation to what is happening.

You allow your self, other people and your environment to have the freedom to be – whatever they want to be – instead of trying to conform everything to your limited, controlled view.

Control is an illusion – a mirage.

As much as we try to order our lives (with time, and other systems) the unknown element always remains. We’re reminded of this every day. (For example, will the stock market rise or fall?)

Notice this week when you become tense, or stressed or upset. Can you see how your idea of what should be happening is determining your response and affecting your emotions and your body?

Don’t limit yourself or the world to only your idea of what should be happening.

Let go of trying to control and let yourself ride the wave of possibilities.

(This post is #4 in a 5 part series on Time)

Ok, so we’ve established that:

1. What keeps us from knowing abundance in time is our inability to accept what we have – we always want more and,

2.  Time as we know it and live it is a mental construction.

But, while we’re working on being satisfied and playing around with our ability to shift our time perspective – we still have our endless to do lists and routine daily demands.

How do we “manage our time” and respond to what is happening?

We learn to value the process.

As much as we would like to skip the process and get right to our goal, that just isn’t possible – especially with fundraising – because everything is a process.

Which means every goal, every action – everything on our to do lists – is made up of steps.

Let’s use as an example – the goal of receiving a $1 million unrestricted bequest gift from a longtime supporter.

The process:

1. Your organization has a compelling mission with clearly defined goals and explicit need for support.
2. You craft a direct mail piece with specific examples of how every donation impacts and strengthens your work.
3. You receive a $15 donation from a new donor in response to your mailing.
4. You send a thank you letter welcoming your new donor and inviting her to contact you at any time with any questions she may have.
5. Years pass, and this new donor becomes a consistent supporter, making small gifts of $15 in response to all of your annual and special appeals.
6. You or someone from your organization is traveling to the town where this donor lives and you organize a gathering (any size – could be a simple lunch or larger house party) for all local donors.
7. You meet this donor at the event and learn more about what her interests are and why she is committed to funding your work.
8. You send a thank you note expressing your pleasure at having met her and thanking her for her long time support.
9. You enter this information into your database and make a note to send articles and program updates on issues that are important to this donor.
10. Your database prompts you with reminders to send these periodic personal updates.
11. This donor responds to a planned giving insert that was included in the thank you letter for her last gift. She tells you she has included your organization in her will.
12. You call her and personally thank her for this commitment (and if appropriate, gather more information about the type of planned gift.)
13. At least once a year you send personalized correspondence (with program content and no direct appeal) to all your legacy donors updating them on how your organization is meeting needs in the community and creating positive and lasting change.
14. Years pass (in which your organization continues to receive high ratings from Charity Navigator, GuideStar and BBB Wise Giving Alliance.)
15. You receive a letter in the mail from a trust officer letting you know that this donor has passed away and that your organization will be receiving $1 million.
16. You recognize the amazing generosity of this individual with a press release and tribute in your communications pieces (Annual Report, Newsletter, website/blog) with concrete examples of the impact her money will have.

Quite a list of steps isn’t it? And as you probably noticed, this is a mini version of the actual process as each of the steps includes its own process (like developing a direct mail piece, organizing an event, or the organization continuing to receive high ratings for good work.)

There are always other people involved in the process as well – which means adding meetings, coordination and planning to the list.

Plus the reality that we will mostly likely enter and leave the process before the goal is reached and that there are concurrent processes in motion at various stages with every donor and prospect.

If the goal is all that matters we will spend 99% of our time feeling impatient with what we are doing because we’re not at the goal.

And even once we reach a goal there are always more steps after the goal (i.e. thanking the donor for her gift and continuing to develop the relationship) so every goal becomes another step in the process.

Value the process – let everything you do become as important as your goal.

You have to go through the process anyway – why not enjoy yourself each step of the way?

(This post is #3 in a 5 part series on Time)

Happy Monday!

What’s on your schedule this week?

Does it matter, with everything that needs to get done, that time as we know it and live it is only a mental construction?

Sure, some say that time doesn’t actually “exist” but the social and economic fabric of our global society (and all of our technology) runs on our collectively built and individually maintained concept of Time.

With our calendars and clocks, our PDAs and watches – our appointments, deadlines and responsibilities – of course time exists. Because we created it, and live our lives by it, time exists for us.

The clock helps regulate each hour of the day so we can plan our lives.

We can schedule when things need to happen and organize our thoughts, our actions and our relationships accordingly. With this system we know when to work and when to sleep and we can communicate, travel and trade locally and worldwide within a commonly understood context.

Yet, even inside this fixed structure (though we’ve created UTC and universally agreed that this is “The Official Time”) we still have various cultural and social understandings of time. We each move within our own personal time zones.

Robert Levine, in A Geography of Time, documents his travels around the globe researching the wide diversity of lived clock time in different countries.

John Boyd and Philip Zimbardo in their new book, The Time Paradox, design six categories to describe (from a Western point of view) individual time perspectives and offer a test you can take to discover yours.

Reading about the history of clocks and calendars reveals the elaborate fashioning of our time definitions. And scientists posit various theories and equations for time and debate their implications but there is not one unified, agreed upon theory.*

Our modern day understanding of time is built on an intricate web of mathematical calculations, scientific theories, economics, marketing, national laws and international agreements combined with our cultural and personal definitions of time.

Time appears solid because we have organized our internal and external lives on our definition of it.

Why does any of this matter when you have a million things to do today?

You don’t really have time to think about time.

Which is exactly why your perspective of time matters.

Notice how often your view of time keeps you circling. You always end up at the same place: with not enough time.

Knowing that time is only a mental construction gives you the freedom to create and navigate your own time zone.

Suddenly, where before there was only one choice, now there are options.

Recognizing the porosity of time opens a door in the busy, time strapped mind.  Here is a way out of one-view thinking into a wider realm of infinite possibilities.

So before you launch into your week, take a minute (which, without your watch doesn’t really “exist” anyway) to examine your personal time zone. Remember that your position and perspective are changeable. You can be flexible.

Time, as we know it and live it, is just a mental construction.

Enjoy the freedom.

(This post is #2 in a 5 part series on Time)

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(*) Books on Time: The History of Clocks and Watches by Kenneth E. Welch; Empires of Time: Calendars, Clocks and Cultures by Anthony Aveni; Marking Time: The Epic Quest to Invent the Perfect Calendar by Duncan Steel; The End of Certainty: Time, Chaos, and the New Laws of Nature by Ilya Prigogine; and Time: A Travel’s Guide by Clifford A. Pickover.

(Of course there are hundreds more. These are just the ones I’ve read.)

There is never enough time.
If only I had more time.

Do you ever have these thoughts?

I know I do. My scarcity mentality always kicks in when it comes to Time. For some reason, there is never enough.

Especially when there’s so much to do…juggling a million and one priorities, rushing to get things done on time, pressured by endless to-do lists and we need to keep up with everything that is happening and there is always something else that needs to be done and…if only there were more Time.

In our fast-paced, multi-tasking, ultra-busy lives, how do we Know Abundance in Time?

This week’s post is the first in a five part series on Time.

Why spend so much time talking about time? Because our understanding of Time affects our relationship with every aspect of our lives – and in today’s world we live our lives by the clock.

Since I know you’re busy, I’ll get right to the point: Our problem is not that there is not enough time. The reason we don’t have enough time is because we are never satisfied with what we have.

Sure, we are grateful for what we have, but we want more. What we have is never enough.

How do we know abundance in time?

Let the time you have be enough.

Let the time you have be more than enough.

I know this seems laughable almost, doesn’t it? Ridiculous even. To know that we have all the time we need, to be satisfied with what we have and to actually enjoy an abundance of time.

There’s too much to do. Too much that has to be done. And we don’t want to be late and we want to make the most of the time that we do have. And people are counting on us. We have deadlines.

Maybe after we finish everything we can know abundance in time.

But this is a futile exercise in impossibility (as you already know looking at your to-do list from last week and your to-do list for the week ahead) because we never finish everything. There is always more to do.

We can’t base knowing abundance in time on our to-do lists.

Looking at what has to be done we will always come up short.

Accept the reality of the time that you do have. Let what you have be enough. Let the time you have be more than enough.

Be satisfied.

This is how to know abundance in Time.

(This post is #1 in a 5 part series on Time)

Happy Monday!

Today is a holiday in the U.S. Are you working? How often do you work on your holidays, your vacations, and your weekends?

Are you always working? Why? What’s so important?

We all know from experience that the to-do list never really ends: one thing is crossed off and another fills the space.

Repeat.

One thing is crossed off and another fills the space. Repeat.

So we live, day by day.

Yet, somehow, even as we replicate this pattern over and over, we believe that we will come to the end of our to-do list and then we’ll rest. Then we will have time for whatever it is we are putting off until we have time for it.

Are we there yet?

We also have the tendency to think that we are the center of the universe. Have you noticed that? How important we think we are to whatever is happening or to whatever we think needs to happen?

We can’t take a break right now because then, whatever we think needs to happen won’t happen, and it needs to happen and we need to make it happen. Suddenly everything relies on our action, on our doing. The world needs us.

So the story in our mind goes.

Our thinking can get a bit delusional at times with the sense of our own importance. Reality checks are necessary.

Take a reality check break today. You already know your list isn’t going anywhere, so Relax. Turn off your computer and go outside into the world. Look around.

See how much is happening without any effort at all on your part.

Pause. Notice something that you have never noticed before. Talk to someone you have never talked to before. Listen to what they have to say.

Watch the sunset and stare up at the night sky. See the billions of stars and galaxies stretching into the unknown. Remember how small you and your thoughts and your to-do lists are in the universe of all that is.

Laugh at the absurdity of your own sense of importance. Repeat.

Welcome to Know Abundance!

A new positive thinking blog for fundraisers – and anyone else looking to supplant scarcity mentality with abundant living.

Delivered fresh every Monday – just when you need a dose of positivity to get your fundraising act in gear.

Know Abundance is living and working from the awareness that there is nothing you need that you don’t already have.

This blog is for you if:

• you worry about how to raise money to support your organization
• you stress about how to get everything done
• you wonder how to manage donor (and your own) fears about economy

Posted every Monday, Know Abundance is:

• fundraising from plenty and gratitude
• positive thinking to help you navigate your work week
• perspective to widen your outlook beyond daily headlines

Know Abundance is a shared journey. I, like you, am learning to live and work in new ways. To shed the thought patterns and beliefs that keep us trapped in a never-ending scramble for time, money, resources, and market share. To embrace the mantra, “Everything I need I already have.”

I know how hard you are working to bring into reality your vision of a better world. Know Abundance is for you. The weekly posts offer tools to see your worry, stress and fears in a different light, to know abundance even in the midst of scarcity.

Coming up in January:

Jan. 12 – Why think positive?

Jan. 19 – Live Your Dreams Today

Jan. 26 – Scarcity as Reality is Relative

I welcome your comments, questions and participation as we learn together.