Have you created a daily dashboard for yourself?

It is important to have a daily dashboard that guides you to take course correction. We usually get focused on one thing or another and get blind sided to the rest; Very soon we get our lives dangerously imbalanced.

Imbalance has tremendous impact on our quality of life.

Please find below some symptoms

• You are extremely successful professionally but lost out on family relationship
• You are successful and have a good family relationship, but financially you have created a mess
• You are so focused on friends and relationship that you neglect your professional life
• You are so busy getting through the day that you forget to stop and learn
• You find you are living a life against your values or your values have quietly shifted
• You have completely missed out on the spiritual goals you set
• You find that it is more than a year since you spent some quiet time with yourself
• You have no friends

Well, these are some of the symptoms. It generally manifests itself as a feeling of restlessness, for you know deep in your heart that you are spinning your wheels and getting no where.

The antidote to this frightful state, is daily monitoring. What you need to do is construct a dashboard with which you can constantly monitor and course correct.

The dashboard, I use is depicted in the figure. You may begin with a few of the dials as you may have not constructed data feed for all the dials

Explanation:

Physical:

• Exercise, nutrition, relaxation, sleep etc.

Learning:

• Professional, new skills, training, new hobbies---

Living and adding values:

• Your values, value shifts, and your daily contribution levels in various areas of your life

Financial:

• Your bank balance, spending pattern, debt, earning capacity---

Relationship:

• Your family, friends, new network you have been nurturing---

Spiritual:

• Your spiritual goals, exercises, meditation---

You have to build your dashboard; Some of the dials need a lot of intra-personal work but you have to build it sooner or later.

Use this powerful concept to live a balanced life. Your dashboard will not only make your life richer, it will also make your life balanced.

Use dashboard daily!

Try it out and share your experience here.

Use this tool to make your life productive!

We are living in times when we need to focus on multiple things. Assembly line approach to work is ineffective in most of the situations we find ourselves in; This is true, especially, if you are a knowledge worker.

In an attempt to solve this problem many people try multitasking. Multitasking is not only dangerous, it is outright ineffective.

It can result in burn out and you will end up producing low quality work.

What I am posting here is a tool that will help you to succeed. The tool is simple and fun to use.

Try it out! Refer to the picture which is self-explanatory.

• Scan: You scan for 3 minutes or longer for various activities
• Spot: You spot an activity based on the context, situation and the goals you have in mind
• Focus: You focus on the activity for a preset time
• Accomplish: You accomplish the preset goal for the activity
• Stop: You stop the activity
• Break: You take a break which is predetermined

You go through the cycle again and again through out the day. At night you take a long break-you sleep. Next day you continue---

Try it for a day. You will be stunned at what you can accomplish.

Do share in your experience here.

How much do you use the things you buy?

Week in week out we shop. One of our favourite pastimes is to go to a mall and window shop; very soon window shopping becomes actual shopping.


The things we buy usually are:

1. Books


2. DVD


3. Clothes


4. gadgets


5. magazines


6. grocery


7. vegetables


8. perfumes


9. Watches


10. Jewellery


11. trinkets


12. Stationary

The list can go on and on. I am sure you can come with a similar list or even a more comprehensive one.

In addition to this we subscribe to magazines, buy comics, subscribe to all kinds of channels on satellite TV.

As I look back to the past six months, I am amazed and also stunned. A thought immediately struck me.

How much of what we buy do we actually use?

• There are many books I have not yet read


• There are many magazines I have not read-Example-Harvard Business Review


• There are movies (DVDs) we have not yet seen (Last Saturday I subscribed to a home delivery movie rental agency)


• There are channels on my TV I have never seen


• There are regular channels I have not watched for a long time


• I have not used my Nikon D80 SLR for a long time


• I have not used my Sony Camcorder for a long time


• We have not used our printer and scanner for a very, very, very long time


• I have one more TV neatly packed in a box


• I have 18 hours of digital video tapes not yet processed and burnt on DVD

I think I will stop here because this is becoming a really long painful list.

The point I am driving at is this:

We buy a lot of things (It costs money to buy) and we use it very erratically or do not use it at all.

We need to take stock of stuff we buy/subscribe. and we need to use them to our advantage. I think systematically planning to use the stuff we have and using them is the sign of prosperity and plenty; Otherwise you may have everything and still live an impoverished life.

We need to have gratitude for all the stuff we have and use them wisely.

Take stock! Are you doing justice to the effort you put in and the money you spent?

Look around you and use the stuff you have wisely. It is the best foot you can put forward to live life prosperously.

When was the last time you thought of your best friends?

It is important in life to have friends; More important to have true friends; And extremely important to have best friends. While it is easy to have acquaintances, it is very difficult to have good friends. If you have good friends and few of them are your best friends you can count yourself as a very lucky one on this dreary planet we are living in.

I would like to share with you a beautiful poem composed by my daughter. She composed this for her best friends. I found an universality in this poem and hence I am posting it for all of you who will read this post.

The Poem:

My Dear Friend…

Friendship… what does it mean?
A question in the mind of every teen
An answer I have found through a few
Cause I have friends that are very true!

I think I truly am a really lucky girl,
As I silently watch true friendship unfurl
Cause my friends, they are always there,
And they never let me any sorrow bear

Across the distances long and forlorn,
To be the best of friends we were born
Such high standards for us we have set,
But I trust you’ll surpass it, do not fret

Be it in the morning, evening or at anytime,
Even at midnight I wouldn’t think for even a dime
Where ever you are, India or U S A,
I know your support is always on its way

You follow every single unwritten rule,
To not honor you, I would be a fool!
I will not thank you cause you’re my friend,
But I can promise to love you till the very end!

Do share in your experiences.