A couple of weeks ago, I was reading in the awesome and inspiring The High 5 Habit book (because my learning community was prepping to discuss it) when I came across a concept that I like. No, I LOVE. It concerns Jealousy. I cannot tell you how many times I see a friend or family member post or share something that makes me initially respond with “JEALOUS!!” But then I stop myself because, you know, we’ve sort of been taught that it’s wrong, selfish, (you can insert your own word here) to be jealous of someone else. We should be happy with our own lot in life, yada, yada.
But this book and Mel Robbins offers a new approach to jealousy that I want to spend some time playing around with. I mean…like I could create a program, class, blog, or podcast series around this!
Mel suggests that when our initial, or when our gut reaction is “JEALOUS,” we should take that as a sign. As a message that we need to flip the experience into inspired action (my niece Willow will tell you that Inspire is one of my favorite words). So what does that mean?
When we feel jealous of a person, activity, experience, photo, etc. it’s time to go looking for something. What is making me jealous of this? What specific parts do I wish I were experiencing in my own life? What parts of this might I not like so much? How would I tweak this if I was creating my own experience? And most importantly, What negative thoughts are stopping me?
Do you see what I saw? Literally, I can take my gut reaction instinct of “JEALOUS” and each time it happens, I can look deeper, consider more, and then instead of remaining in jealousy, use it to launch myself into action to create a future scenario where this is my life!
I can use it as an inspired call to action!
So naturally, I decided to be more aware of this reaction within me. And what do you know, it took less than 24 hours for my baby brother John to whip me into a frenzy of dreaming and goal setting! First, it started with this lovely (trust me, after laughing, you would probably plug your ears) rendition of John singing “Right Here Waiting” along with Richard Marx on the radio. And naturally, being the oldest sibling, I shared my intention that someday I find the opportunity to share that video with conference planners who have invited him to give a keynote address and who need material for his introduction. I can see the video playing on a LARGE screen (maybe a whole wall of screens) at high volume, when he walks onto the stage, The Ellen Show style. It will be GREAT!!
His reaction to my plans? To tell me that he was just invited to speak in Norway. Yes, NOR freaking WAY! Instant Jealousy! But jealousy that I fully intend to flip into action and use for good to push me to re-launch my own speaking, presentation, and retreat engagements. I have decided that my next keynote is right around the corner. So thank you John!
And if you are planning a conference and John Nelson (https://www.esri.com/arcgis-blog/author/j_nelson/) is the keynote, let me know. I now have 14 of those videos ready to share!
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