Start Right Now

I've spent this past week in Guerilla Business School – there’s a lot to write about – but I’m writing this before I go.

I think you’ve noticed how much faster life is – Well, that’s simple math. If you draw an exponential growth curve, you’ll see that it takes a long time to rise – it seems gentle. But when it rises, it is extremely steep – And it’s rising. In fact, we are in an exponential rise in our civilization – knowledge, crises, inventions, books, gadgets, toys, population, … almost anything we can measure – it’s not hard to keep up – it’s impossible. So prepare to be surprised – always… It will change. The impossible happens every day.

What can we do in the face of massive, continuous change? That’s this title. Don’t wait. As I’ve written before – adopt a policy based on confidence and support – you have or can develop confidence and you can certainly amass support. So-- – Ready, Fire, Aim. With confidence and support you can correct as conditions change. And they will change. Complacency leads to obsolescence.

But start what? I’m inclined to say, ‘whatever.’ A new business; a new project; acting on a dream that may vanish; saying ‘I love you’ before it’s too late; finishing something; communicating with someone; being generous; do something brand new – for the first time. We have to live longer because there’s so much - and so much more to do.

Here’s something new and worthwhile – important – and it’s four nights away:
Thursday evening, March 15th, from 7:30 – 8:30 is START night – living a sustainable life in a sustainable world.
The number is 1-218 936 6666 access: 998765#

If you want to use this article (or any of my articles) in your Ezine, newsletter or website, you can – as long as you include this bio with it:
Michael Lipp, MS, coach and author provides innovative and profitable strategies to entrepreneurs, seniors, and people committed to sustainability and/or creativity. My website is being redesigned – Write me at michaellipp@1stclasscoaching.com

Useful Quotes
It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power.
Alan Cohen

In describing today's accelerating changes, the media fire blips of unrelated information at us. Experts bury us under mountains of narrowly specialized monographs. Popular forecasters present lists of unrelated trends, without any model to show us their interconnections or the forces likely to reverse them. As a result, change itself comes to be seen as anarchic, even lunatic.
Alvin Toffler

If you have always done it that way, it is probably wrong.
Charles Kettering

In times of change, learners inherit the Earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
Eric Hoffer

All conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change.
G.K.Chesterton

The Creative Corner

Entropy and Growth

“Who is doing these awful things,” she shrieked, “to me?”
“It is I,” the Exponential Growth Rate,” the giant roared.
“Mercy!” she cried,
“Can no one save me fwom this fwightening fate?”
“No!” bellowed the giant, “No one!”
And he ate her.

“Why, that’s not so fwightening,” she murmured.

One of the most famous laws of physics is
the 2nd law of thermodynamics –
the law of entropy.
Entropy tells us that things change
all by themselves,
that things go from a state of order
to a state of disorder,
that the universe is running down.

We spend much of our lives in the futile effort to resist
or even reverse
entropy.
Too bad. Cobwebs do gather in corners.

What we don’t realize is that
the very effort to reverse entropy is entropy.
Technological growth demonstrates entropy.
The more things there are;
the more particulated the universe is,
the more disorder exists.
Complete heterogeneity is the same as complete chaos.
Every time we discover a new “fact”
the universe becomes more complicated and even further
fragmented,
further disordered.

And we are discovering new facts
at an alarming rate -and the rate is increasing -
and the rate of increase is increasing –

So many trees; so few forests.

When everything is on-line
and available at our fingertips, then everything
is well-hidden and nothing is known.

The more we discover, the easier it is to see
that we are each unique – and none different.
So Let the Good Times Roll

Perspectives March 5th 2007

Unabashed Coaching and Consulting

One of the things about coaching is that it’s the opposite of consulting. When you hire a consultant you hire an expert – you hire answers. But a coach is paid not to know. In fact, I used to have business cards that said, “I don’t know… I really don’t know.” I am hired to ask questions so that you discover that you know or that you can know. My internet coaching is, I confess, partially consulting, because I do know a lot of answers – and I’m still learning like crazy. But my coaching value lies in your knowledge – it’s mutual – we learn from each other.

One of the reasons this is my theme today is that I am really grappling to integrate this new view of the universe I have. Sometimes I pretend that I know. This is a common issue for me. What keeps me sane (that is - grappling) is that I occasionally listen to different media-heads whose job it is to adopt the pretense that they know – or that they are ‘above having to know--- they simply judge.’

Okay – what is this view? Where has it come from and where do I think it’s going? Let’s see if I can do some organizing:
*** I really didn’t grasp anything about my stewardship of Earth, of all of it. This began when I made a commitment to support creating the sustainable end of hunger. Still, I was mostly concerned with me and was willing to be part of that movement – even to own it. But I didn’t truly get it until I did the “Awakening the Dreamer” Symposium. When I saw “The Universe Story” (by Neil Rogin, from the writings of Thomas Merton and Brian Swimme) I began to really see our fundamental relatedness, our true interconnectivity.
*** Then I saw “What The Bleep” (do we know?) and “Mindwalk” which see the world through the lens of quantum mechanics and raise some fundamental questions.
*** And then I saw “The Secret,” which I’ve written a bit about. Simply stated, I can see the Law of Attraction as fundamental – and again, our relatedness and interconnectivity are clear.
I thought it was an enormous step to see myself not just as “myself,” but now… I’m grappling.
I got it. We’re fundamentally interconnected. So how does that affect how I live? I’ll keep writing about what I see, because it’s useful for me and will hopefully be valuable for you.

Thursday evening, March 15th, from 7:30 – 8:30 is START night –living a sustainable life in a sustainable world.
The number is 1-218 936 6666 access: 998765#

If you want to use this article (or any of my articles) in your Ezine, newsletter or website, you can – as long as you include this bio with it:
Michael Lipp, MS, coach and author provides innovative and profitable strategies to entrepreneurs, seniors, and people committed to sustainability and/or creativity. My website is being redesigned – Write me at michaellipp@1stclasscoaching.com

Useful Quotes
It's kind of fun to do the impossible.
Walt Disney

All human beings have this burden in life to constantly figure out what's true, what's authentic, what's meaningful, what's dross, what's a hallucination, what's a figment,
what's madness. We all need to figure out what is valuable, constantly.
Maxine Hong Kingston

When the forms of an old culture are dying, the new culture is created by a few
people who are not afraid to be insecure.
Rudolf Bahro

People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child -- our own two eyes. All is a miracle.
Thich Nhat Hanh

Everyone's life is under someone's control - it might as well be under your own so that you can direct your destiny.
Harry Tucker ( Strategy Adviser – Microsoft)

With laissez-faire and price atomic,
Ecology's Uneconomic,
But with another kind of logic

Economy's Unecologic.
Kenneth E. Boulding (1910 – 1993)

The Creative Corner

A Whimsical Commercial

The I Ching is the Chinese poetry of the future –
Throw sticks or coins; they resonate with your soul
The Co ching is my prose

to invent your future
It resonates with your voice
And elicits your choice

I used to think I knew
Who knew I knew?
I could gather my forces
And quote my sources
‘Cause I was meant
To win my every argument
This was a bad beginning
It’s how to lose by winning

When it comes to having fun
Two heads are better than one
And itching is
Better than bitching
According to the I Ching

Perspectives February 26th, 2007

The Knee Bone Connected To...

This is late getting out today. I apologize. I'll have to open up more of my life - and I want to do that. I spent the last four days at a magical retreat in a Rock House in the desert outside of Wickenburg, Arizona. It was a meeting of the Board of Directors of the Global Abundance Alliance (GAA). There will be pictures of this extraordinary place in our wiki - globalpromises.jot.com - in a day or two.

But I want to speak of the GAA's vision, which is:
All people live in full awareness of the interconnectedness of life, that we are the source of the world we live in, a world providing for all.

When we first created our vision, simply saying that life was interconnected was a somewhat radical notion. Today, those of you who read this know this. Today our thrust is that people live in full awareness of it... And I ask you to imagine our world -- all of it -- if people were in full awareness that we are all interconnected. How could there be conflict? How could there be continuing degradation of our environment? How could there be poverty and homelessness?

How could there be ... and on and on?

I've spent the last few posts writing about The Secret which really speaks of that interconnection and the feedback mechanism of the Universe to our understanding of that relationship. I want to ask some more questions. If you lived in full awareness that we are all interconnected, how would this change the way you live - your business - your relationships - your commitment to our environment? How can you begin to think and act consistent with this? How can you deal with the reality of old habits? How can you remember that the Knee Bone is Connected to the Thigh Bone... and hear the Word?

Useful Quotes

A student asked: "Miss Keller, is there anything that could have been worse than losing your sight?" Helen Keller replied: "Yes, I could have lost my vision."
Quoted by Bill Moyers

No employer today is independent of those about him.
He cannot succeed alone, no matter how great his ability or capital.
Business today is more than ever a question of cooperation.
Orison Swett Marden (1850-1924, founder of Success Magazine)

Whatever you do will be insignificant,
but it is very important that you do it.
Mahatma Gandhi

We think too small, like the frog at the bottom of the well.

He thinks the sky is only as big as the top of the well.

If he surfaced, he would have an entirely different view.

Mao Tse-Tung

Creative Corner

The Tortoise and The Hare Hike

We are all trail creatures

Vicky is the hare who bounds freely,

moving magically from perch to perch.

Her feet already always know the way.

I am the tortoise, looking down

for certain footing, leaving no room to play.

We pause and see the desert mountain world,

a world inside a world I never knew -

a world of such stochastic beauty,

jagged and asymmetric. The only curves

are curves of Saguaro cactus

and some boulders smoothed by millenia,

cloaked with lichen, painted yellow to green.

Everywhere the stubborn life lies dormant,

patiently waiting, waiting for water,

waiting with thirst to burst alive

again with blossoms

blossoms of unexpected hue, but

unexpected only to those

plodding tortoise feet

Perspectives: February 19th, 2007

Life, Love and Money

I’ve been writing these articles for years. And I’ve always seen them as somehow not relevant to my work – having a certain nobility, a purity of purpose - blecch. One result of this is that whenever I’ve ‘advertised’ for clients, I’ve had no response.

I’ve finally come to see how off-purpose I’ve been about this. (This realization is consistent with my ‘discovery’ of The Secret) In my background somewhere has been this peculiar relationship with money that is completely contrary to the point of having money. Listen to this absurdity: If you love what you do, you shouldn’t do it for money. This goes a long way to explaining my history.

It’s clear to me that while most of you (I hope) don’t have this insanity, most of us have some insanity mixing up our life, loving it all and dealing with success and money.

Here’s my personal point. I intend to supplement my income in a big way by my use of the internet. I’m actually an expert on how to do this, but have shied away from even talking about it because of my self-contradictions. No more. I’m dealing now with three sites, currently evolving and heading toward Profit. Most of you would like your sites to be more than (at best) animated business cards. I’m available.

Thursday evening, from 7:30 – 8:30 is START night –living a sustainable life in a sustainable world.
The number is 1-218 936 6666 access: 998765#

If you want to use this article (or any of my articles) in your Ezine, newsletter or website, you can – as long as you include this bio with it:
Michael Lipp, MS, coach and author provides innovative and profitable strategies to entrepreneurs, seniors, and people committed to sustainability and/or creativity. My website is being redesigned – Write me at michaellipp@1stclasscoaching.com

Useful Quotes

The mind has exactly the same power as the hands:
not merely to grasp the world, but to change it.
Colin Wilson

The more I want to get something done, the less I call it work.
Richard Bach

To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you. Train yourself never to put off the word or action for the expression of gratitude.
Albert Schweitzer

It's good to have money and the things that money can buy, but it's good, too, to check up once in a while and make sure that you haven't lost the things that money can't buy.
George Horace Lorimer

Money is like a sixth sense –
and you can't make use of the other five without it
W. Somerset Maugham

The Creative Corner
Wrong Way Corrigan
I used to think that profit
was profligate
I had my own scales and measured
in my peculiar way
my hours against my money
This left me with fewer hours
to enjoy
and a minimum of money t
o enjoy them with.
But now I see the world’s
been waiting for me and I have been
so profligate,
so recklessly wasteful,
that I have lived to minimize my contributions

Perspectives - February 19th, 2007

Life, Love and Money

I’ve been writing these articles for years. And I’ve always seen them as somehow not relevant to my work – having a certain nobility, a purity of purpose - blecch. One result of this is that whenever I’ve ‘advertised’ for clients, I’ve had no response.

I’ve finally come to see how off-purpose I’ve been about this. (This realization is consistent with my ‘discovery’ of The Secret) In my background somewhere has been this peculiar relationship with money that is completely contrary to the point of having money. Listen to this absurdity: If you love what you do, you shouldn’t do it for money. This goes a long way to explaining my history.

It’s clear to me that while most of you (I hope) don’t have this insanity, most of us have some insanity mixing up our life, loving it all and dealing with success and money.

Here’s my personal point. I intend to supplement my income in a big way by my use of the internet. I’m actually an expert on how to do this, but have shied away from even talking about it because of my self-contradictions. No more. I’m dealing now with three sites, currently evolving and heading toward Profit. Most of you would like your sites to be more than (at best) animated business cards. I’m available.

Thursday evening, from 7:30 – 8:30 is START night –living a sustainable life in a sustainable world.
The number is 1-218 936 6666 access: 998765#

If you want to use this article (or any of my articles) in your Ezine, newsletter or website, you can – as long as you include this bio with it:
Michael Lipp, MS, coach and author provides innovative and profitable strategies to entrepreneurs, seniors, and people committed to sustainability and/or creativity.
(My website is broken, but will be fixed next week - You can write me at michaellipp@1stclasscoaching.com)

Useful Quotes

The mind has exactly the same power as the hands:
not merely to grasp the world, but to change it.
Colin Wilson

The more I want to get something done, the less I call it work.
Richard Bach

To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you. Train yourself never to put off the word or action for the expression of gratitude.
Albert Schweitzer

It's good to have money and the things that money can buy, but it's good, too, to check up once in a while and make sure that you haven't lost the things that money can't buy.
George Horace Lorimer

Money is like a sixth sense –
and you can't make use of the other five without it
W. Somerset Maugham

The Creative Corner

Wrong Way Corrigan
I used to think that profit
was profligate
I had my own scale of work and measured
in my peculiar way
my hours against my money
This left me with fewer hours to enjoy
and a minimum of money to enjoy them with.
But now I see the world’s
been waiting for me and I have been
so profligate,
so recklessly wasteful,
that I have lived to minimize
my contributions

Perspectives - 2-12-07

Perspectives – February 12th, 2007

I need help!! I’ll give a free book to you if you come up with a name for my book site that works and is available. You’d be surprised at what I’ve tried. The name has to be easy to use, spell, etc. I like 1stclasspublishing, but it doesn’t fit those criteria – it’s too long and hard to spell…1st drives people crazy.

Science and Spirituality

There’s a new consistency between micro physics and macro-physics, between quantum physics and cosmology. And this is remarkably consistent with spirituality.

Now as far as I know, we still think we’re living in a Newtonian Universe – the planets are billiard balls; we are all separate, independent bodies – this is not that; that is not the other – It’s a bit like how are eyes are fooled to think the sun moves around earth – ‘It’ rises here, moves around and sets there. We haven’t even caught up with Einstein.

Yet now the “truth” emerges, makes sense and is a little bit taught… Movies have caught up, so young people are learning (What the Bleep, The Universe Story, and, of course The Secret ($5+ at www.thesecret.tv, now seen via Oprah and so seen by millions)

The Secret actually speaks to how to live with this new knowledge. For those who don’t know, the basic knowledge is that we all ‘come’ from the same place – that we are all manifestations of pure energy. How this shows up is through a basic law of the universe – the Law of Attraction – the universe responds to the energy you emanate through your emotions, thoughts and actions and you can’t fake it.

It will take a while, but our world view, our beliefs, our plans and our futures will begin to shift to be consistent with this marriage of our science and our spirituality. Stay tuned.

This Thursday evening, from 7:30 – 8:30 is the start of START – one way of living consistent with the Secret. The number is 1-218 936 6666 access: 998765#

Useful Quotes

We are not creatures of circumstance; We are creators of circumstance."
Benjamin Disraeli

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree Martin Luther King Jr

The best things in life aren't things

Art Buchwald.

Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself, and know that everything in this life has purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings given to us to learn from.
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Happiness is when what you think,
what you say, and what you do
are in harmony.
Mahatma Gandhi

The Creative Corner

I sit here sworn to write,
To write a poem that weds my words
To the way it works. It isn’t easy
It isn’t hard; it’s a poem.
So all I have to do is let my words sing
And the universe will harmonize
And I know there’s always harmony.
It’s not so much to want,
I only have to say
And the truth of what I want
Has more value than what I say.
It bounces off the walls of heaven
It resonates and rebounds all around us
And my real words are my real life

Perspectives - February 5th, 2007:Let’s Talk About Start

Perspectives – February 5th, 2007

Let’s Talk About Start

I’m working on a website that will include START. It’s called www.Grow2Green.com.
Nancy essentially owns that site. It will consist of 3 things – a newsletter that shares about what we’ve experienced in greening our lives, the START website, and pointers to what we consider useful/valuable green products.

Here’s what START is - People decide they’re committed to a green world. We are distressed by the virtually daily news stories of environmental ‘problems.’ We keep hearing that there are things we can do. But somehow we don’t feel as if we’re doing enough, or doing it right, or making any difference.

I will use my knowledge and experience as a coach to work with you to support you powerfully in this area – how to set specific goals, how to gather support, how to enroll other people in what you want, etc. In addition, we’ll deal with specific, pertinent topics as well as coachinbg you on whatever you need to move forward.

We’ll also have a chat room and forum on the site – We want it to be totally valuable to you.

The first START call will be from 7:30 – 8:30est on Thursday, Feb 8. The number is
1-218-936-6666 – x 998765#. I haven’t arranged for calls to be recorded (yet) – I’m still an amateur.

START will consist of two teleconferences a month, for people committed to making a difference with their lives, and will cost $15/month or $150/yr. This first call is free, of course.

Useful Quotes

We are seeking another basic outlook: the world as an organization. This would profoundly change the categories of our thinking and influence our practical attitudes. We must envision the biosphere as a whole with mutually reinforcing or mutually destructive interdependencies.
Ludwig Von Bertalanffy

We won't have a society if we destroy the environment.
Margaret Mead

What is the good of having a nice house
without a decent planet to put it on?
Henry David Thoreau

Smile, it's free therapy
Edwardo Rosso

My experience with these groups is that the stronger the collective wisdom present, the stronger my sense of unique individuality -- only now it's within the context of the whole rather than separate from the whole.
Tom Callanan

The Creative Corner

At Last, I Learned to See

I learned to look at the sky
To see the clouds form and move
In stately kaleidoscopic dancing
I learned to see, to see the sun
Change the colors of the trees
The colors of the seasons
The colors of the faces of my friends
I’ve become afraid to look
I don’t believe it

Before -I never even saw the sky
I didn’t care
I noticed rain and snow
I noticed heat and cold
Only because I had to
I had to dress you know
I had to clothe my body
But I never cared
I was snared by the culture,
By the way it seems to be

And now I see
It’s time to move the dance,
Change the pace and rhythm

and be in tune with
our partners – who leads
And who follows.

Michael Lipp
www.1stclasscoaching.com

Keith Olbermann

I occasionally watch Keith on MSNBC. Last night I thought his commentary was beyond extraordinary. I'm amazed that he hasn't been fired. Even my wife was blown away and she hates listening to news.

It was a call to action. I kept hearing Joseph Welch at the Senate hearings many years ago, when he confronted Joe McCarthy and said, "At long last, Senator, have you no decency?" But this was deeper, more complete and complex. He showed film clips of our president accusing all people who were against the war and against the torture as being traitors. He, Bush, lied about non-Bush positions over and over.

He said very clearly that Bush was attempting to destroy the very fabric of our country by destroying our constitution. He showed an interview with General Franks that was wonderful and fair and explicit in its understanding of what used to make our nation the greatest - our love of law and peace.

If you can somehow find a rebroadcast, find it. This should be mandatory for all students.