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Charlie Gilkey: Start Finishing Your Best Work

Charlie Gilkey is an entrepreneur and productivity expert who founded the company Productive Flourishing. With Sounds True, he has published the new book Start Finishing: How to Go from Idea to Done. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon speaks with Charlie about crafting our best work—and more importantly, how to complete it. They discuss the process of deciding what your best work actually is, as well as how ideas grow into successful projects. Charlie explains why a project needs to be divided into “chunks” in order to really move forward, emphasizing that tangible benchmarks are imperative for actually finishing the work. Finally, Tami and Charlie talk about “creative constipation” and the courage it takes to pour one’s whole self into a beloved endeavor. (69 minutes)

3 Ways to Deepen Gratitude This Holiday Season

It is true that misery cannot simultaneously exist alongside gratitude and that, despite ourselves, we are constantly being given more than we give. To prove that point, try this simple, elegant practice and see for yourself. Please note: If you resist doing this exercise, consider that you are doing so because you, like most human beings, prefer to believe that you give more than you receive. If you find you’re wrong, what will happen to your resentment or other feelings of disappointment?

Naikan Inventory List

Take a few full size notebook paper and draw three columns. At the top of column #1, write “What he/she/they gave to me.” At the top of column #2, write “What I gave to him/her/them.” At the top of column #3, write “The trouble I caused him/her/them. Exhaust each column with your list of SPECIFIC items before moving onto the next. The timeline to consider is the last 3 months. The use of “always” or “usually” should be avoided. Be precise.

Write three letters of gratitude

You should have enough evidence to write three separate letters of appreciation to your partner. Be sure to make each different, using alternate words expressing thanks to your partner. You can give your partner this letter (or card), or you can simply keep it to yourself. Your choice. The exercise was for you anyway.

Write three letters of apology

You should have enough evidence from your list to apologize for putting your partner out. Make each letter unique by saying “I’m sorry” in different ways. Again, you can give this to your partner or simply keep it private. Either way, the exercise does its magic. If you were honest and thorough, you might have noticed that column #2 was shorter than columns 1 & 3. We are selfish creatures; always aware of what we’re not getting and how our partners cause us grief.

I hope this exercise has helped deepen your gratitude during this holiday season!

Stan Tatkin, PsyD, MFT, is a clinician and author who integrates neuroscience, attachment theory, and current therapies. He directs training programs throughout North America and globally. He is the author of We Do: Saying Yes to a Relationship of Depth, True Connection, and Enduring LoveWired for Love: How Understanding Your Partner’s Brain and Attachment Style Can Help You Defuse Conflict and Build a Secure Relationship. 

The community here at Sounds True wishes you a lovely holiday season! We are happy to collaborate with some of our Sounds True authors to offer you wisdom and practices as we move into this time together; please enjoy this blog series for your holiday season. 

To help encourage you and your loved ones to explore new possibilities this holiday season, we’re offering 40% off nearly all of our programs, books, and courses sitewide. May you find the wisdom to light your way. 

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The Power in Writing Your Obituary

 

While many of us spend December celebrating the holidays, this is also the perfect time for reflection—and for death and rebirth. Writing as a path to awakening is an invitation and celebration—it’s your ticket back to your creative brilliance.

 

Life is short. Time is fleeting and invented—it’s only really ever now. Love is showing up fully with presence—open-hearted, raw, and vulnerable to the world; it’s the only thing that matters. And it’s with this that I invite you to write your own obituary.

 

Reflecting on our own mortality is an opportunity to assess what is truly important in our lives. To reflect on our own mortality is to enter into the community of humanity via the ultimate vulnerability around ceasing to exist. When we approach this with an open heart of curiosity, we have a chance at greater compassion, patience, and understanding with the realization that we are all in this together.

 

Every one of us goes through this fact of our temporary nature in physical form; there is no getting out of this world alive. And here we have a choice—we can put off that reality, ignore it, get completely freaked out about it, or we can face that fact with courage and curiosity.

 

It’s so easy to get caught up in the mundane details and challenges of daily life to the extent that we can forget what we are really living for—what our core purpose in this lifetime truly is! The results of such an investigation are a more awakened sense of self, a deepening compassion for yourself and others—not only those intimate in your life—but for humanity as a whole.

 

Begin by writing it as a list or try writing it as a poem. Tune into any fears or resistances that arise. You could try modeling your piece on a traditional obituary you might read in your favorite newspaper or online magazine. Freewrite into these questions and see what arises.

 

  1. How do you want to be remembered?
  2. What are the true highlights of your life?
  3. Who were the people who most inspired or influenced you?
  4. What did you learn being embodied in this life that you want to share with others?
  5. What held the most meaning for you in your days on this earth?

 

Looking for more great reads?

 

Adapted excerpt from Writing As a Path to Awakening by Albert Flynn DeSilver.

A highly regarded and sought-after speaker and workshop leader, Albert Flynn DeSilver has taught and presented with several luminaries, including Elizabeth Gilbert, Cheryl Strayed, Maxine Hong Kingston, Michael McClure, and U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan among many others. In addition, Albert is an internationally published poet, memoirist, and novelist. His writing has appeared in over 100 literary journals worldwide. He has published several books of poetry and the memoir, Beamish Boy. Albert teaches at the Omega Institute, Esalen, Spirit Rock, and writing conferences nationally. He lives in Northern California.

 

Financial Healing

Tami Simon speaks with Spencer Sherman, a graduate of the Wharton School, who was named one of the top wealth advisors in the US, and is a cofounder of Abacus Wealth Partners. Spencer’s expertise in finance has landed him appearances on CNN and CNBC, and in the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. He’s the author of the book The Cure for Money Madness, and is currently working with Sounds True on The Money and Spirit Online Workshop, an online workshop designed for integrating our spiritual and financial lives. Spencer speaks about taking back our own financial wisdom, the importance of understanding childhood messages about money, and whether it’s really best to rent or buy a home. He also shows us the practice that he calls the “money breath.” (49 minutes)

Relationships, the Brain, and Zero Negativity

Tami Simon speaks with Harville Hendrix, a therapist and educator with over three decades of experience working with couples and singles seeking intimate partners. The cofounder of the Institute for Imago Relationship therapy with his wife Helen, Dr. Hendrix has authored and coauthored a number of influential books on relationship psychology including Getting the Love You Want and Keeping the Love You Find, as well as the six-CD Sounds True audio learning course, Finding and Keeping Love. In this episode, Tami speaks with Harville about a biological explanation for the notion that opposites attract, what it might mean to recognize “otherness” in relationship, and the value of creating a relationship that is without judgment, or “living with zero negativity.” (57 minutes)

Dancing with Cancer

Tami Simon speaks with Gabrielle Roth, a movement innovator, theater director, workshop teacher, and the bestselling author of Sweat Your Prayers and Maps to Ecstasy. With Sounds True she has created three DVD programs of movement meditations for the body and soul: The Wave, The Inner Wave, and The Power Wave. In this episode, Tami speaks with Gabrielle about the five universal rhythms that she uses in her work and why she believes they have the capacity to teach, catalyze, and heal. She talks about how these five rhythms have helped people in hospitals accelerate their healing, and her own experience in using them as she has gone through childbirth and a cancer diagnosis. (55 minutes)

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