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  • Gratitude

    Gratitude

    Gratitude is the grammar of your soul
    Without it life can be quite a mess
    Be mindful that you’re the point of it all
    The story you’re in now was written for you, to enchant, enrapture and elevate you
    You’re not here to play small but to stand tall
    The creators ask nothing in return … except that you burn
    Burn with awe
    Burn with gratitude
    Burn with joy, happiness and LOVE
    You’re the point of it all
    You’re a masterwork creating a masterpiece
    You’re getting to express your divinity
    You’re getting to play here for a little while and get to move the dial
    You’re your creators’ greatest work. Their magnum opus
    Be in awe
    Be in gratitude
    Be you … you who are the point of it all

  • Why you really don’t need more customers

    Why you really don’t need more customers

    You really don’t need more customers, seriously. What you need are more clients.

    On the face of it, customer/consumer/client means the same, doesn’t it?

    But there’s a nuance, and that can make all the difference to how you attract the right business to you.

    Right off the bat, I hate the word consumer in anything. We’re fucking the planet up enough by consuming everything. Consumers remind me of locusts … and there’s nothing redeeming about locusts.

    Now that I’ve got that off my chest, let’s focus on the nuance between customers and clients.

    In my view, a customer is someone who buys a product or service from your company. A client is someone who is under your protection.

    When we see customers:

    • We have predatory attention. We’re hunting them.
    • We don’t look at them as human but as data on an Excel spreadsheet. How many units did we sell this month. How near are we to our targets.
    • Customers are a means to our end. Turnover. Profits. This is what we’re taught in business schools aren’t we … a business is there to make a profit for its owners and shareholders.These are the same business schools that teach us the employees are a resource to get a result. No wonder most employees are disengaged from the work they do. Seriously, how would you feel if someone called you a resource to get a result. A resource implies that it can be used up. How does it feel to be used up and discarded. I think it feels shit and I wouldn’t be keen to work for a company that uses me for its own ends. I want to feel that I’m important and a human being in the whole equation and that I’m cared for and safe.
    • When we look at customers, often we focus on doing things right, not on doing the right things.
    • When we have customers, it is about us and our needs, and not theirs.

    When we see clients:

    • We have receptive attention – we listen to what they need and figure out if we can really help them.
    • We do the right things all the time for the clients’ highest good (even if it means referring them to a competitor because that is in their best interest).
    • We don’t talk about reaching targets. We talk about reaching hearts. “How many clients can we reach today so that we can make their lives better?” I think that’s a more congruent and heart-centred way to deal with clients.
    • We’re heart-centred, kind, compassionate and caring
    • We protect our clients and give them a safe pair of hands to help them over the finish line.

    I think it is more helpful to use the word client than customer. Bring in a culture of heart-centredness. Give your client a safe pair of hands. If you do this, you’ll be able to build the hardest thing to get from any client: TRUST.

    I’m facilitating a workshop called The Courage To Be Visible which speaks to this article and a whole lot more. Check it out.

  • The limits of my language means the limits of my world

    The limits of my language means the limits of my world

    The limits of my language means the limits of my world – Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosopher

    I think I’m quite well-read … from Enid Blyton to Dr. Seuss (Theodore Seuss Giesel, in case you’re interested) and a little bit between.

    Depending who you believe, there are more than 500 000 words in English. I was tested the other day … I only know a woeful 10 000. So much for my reading.

    In light of the unexpected gift of panic attacks I’ve been dealing with over the last couple of months, it occurred to me that being unable to express myself properly has disempowered me from making sense (meaning) of my anxiety.

    I just don’t have the range of words to become fully self-aware, connected and to heal.

    When my therapist asks me how I feel, my range goes to sad, happy, angry and fucked. That’s the sum total of my expression. Ai tog, is that the best I have?

    There’s a treasure trove of nuanced words that can help me navigate what I’m going through, deal with it and heal … if I have the courage to explore them.

    What am I really saying when I’m sad, happy, angry and fucked? I’m limiting the range and depth of the issues that are holding me back.

    I can pick hundreds of lucid words to express myself from the lexicon of language: shame, disappointment, disgust, eviscerating, bored, revolted, loathsome, rejected, abandoned, helpless, hopeless.

    Abandonment

    Let’s take the word, abandoned, which is a big theme for me right now in light of my soulmate and lover’s impending departure to Australia. But the truth be told, her leaving is not the issue at hand. The affliction of abandonment (dad, how could you leave me when I was a year old?) has always been hiding in the dark, dank and dangerous alleyways of my soul, just waiting for an opportunity to be seen and obscure my light.

    What are the nuances of abandonment? Deserted, forsaken, ditched, rejected, discarded, cast aside, thrown away, ostracised, cast off, cast away, unwanted, neglected, forgotten, shunned, unheard, unseen, unimportant and godforsaken.

    I’m sure there are more synonyms to express abandonment. One of the best resources for synonyms that is useful to me is WordHippo, it may be useful to you too.

    You’re smart enough to get the picture, though. Dealing with your shit is is much more complexed, nuanced and meaning-making than just saying, sad, happy, angry and fucked.

    I know three things:

    1. If you find exactly the right word/s and feeling/s and name them and bring them into the light from out of the shadows, it’s easier to deal with them. And, to let go of their grip on you so that you can heal.
    2. It takes courage to to go into the heart of darkness and into the crevices of your soul and claw these demons to the surface. It takes courage to let your light shine and share yourself with the world.
    3. It’s hard work. It’s courageous work. It’s worthwhile work.

    Here’s the thing. What is seen cannot be unseen. Once you have seen it and named it, you have to take responsibility and be held accountable to deal with it. Nobody can save you, I promise you. Only you can save yourself. And that’s hard to come to grips with, isn’t it? Because we like to rationalise and blame others for our situation. But that’s just giving away our power isn’t it? That’s just letting others, and the past, puppeteer your strings so that we’ll never be in control of our own destinies.

    As one of my spiritual mentors, Etsko Schuitema says, “You manufacture your world.” He’s right, of course.

    If you’re going to manufacture something, make it a work of art, make it masterful, make it meaningful, make it a masterwork and make it a magnum opus. Make it you, you masterpiece.

    I love you.

    Let’s go and make a ruckus, you and I.

    Jacques

    PS: The first piece of The Courage To Become Visible Workshop for solopreneurs on 9 April, deals with exactly that – Clarifying your Contribution … How do you become a Masterwork creating a masterpiece. You already are that, this will just help you recognise your magnificence and embrace it in its entirety. Once you do that and open your heart to the infinite possibilities waiting for you, things will change. That’s a promise. Check out the workshop here.

  • Now that was from left field … panic attacks

    Now that was from left field … panic attacks

    A couple of people on this list said that I haven’t sent out a piece of text for a while. Since 8 February. Who knew?

    Who knew that I’d have a massive panic attack in Fourways Mall around that time because I couldn’t find out where my car was parked.

    And, they haven’t stopped since. So, it’s been a bit debilitating.

    But the anxiety and panic that I’ve had to deal with have also been a good thing and a gift. Although they’re really terrifying at the time.

    The attacks have reminded me that I still have unresolved woundings that I need to deal with (or not).

    They’re the normal suspects … you know … shame, guilt, rejection, abandonment, fear. Like I said in my Final Destination article of 8 February … rather deal with your woundings sooner than later because the more you run from them, the more they come at you. A ‘what you resist will persist’ vibe.

    The monsters will keep coming until you face them.

    So, what did I do?

    • A friend recommended a book called DARE: A new way to end anxiety and stop panic attacks. If you are afflicted (gifted) by anxiety, this is a good start and really helpful.
    • I’ve started looking at and processing my past woundings. Good grief, that opened a Pandora’s Box of unimaginable proportions. Fortunately, I have highly evolved conscious friends guiding me to healing, including the intuitive healer, Estelle Kapp and gatekeeper and enlightened guardian, Howard Burger of the Namaskar Wellness Hub. And, of course, my long-suffering friend who has picked me up off the floor more times than I can remember, Stef du Plessis. It is blindingly apparent though, that they can only facilitate the process of healing … I have to take the responsibility to heal myself.
    • So, that’s what I’m doing. Taking the illumination that is already in me and healing me. The result is short of miraculous. Just by facing down and dealing with some of my demons (there’s a long way to go, and apparently it is a lifetime of work), the anxiety and panic attacks have all but gone.
    • I don’t know what you’re going through, probably a lot worse than me. What I do know is that the more I deal with my woundings, the more I start to heal the more my light shines and the closer I get to fulfilling my purpose.

    I trust these insights are helpful to you.

    I love you,

    Jacques

  • Final Destination

    Final Destination

    Do you remember the movie franchise, Final Destination? That one where death has marked you, and no matter how much you try and avoid it, it catches up with you.

    Life is just like that too. All its messiness will catch up with you, sooner or later. Its inevitable. I’ve been trying to run from messiness for 58 years so that I don’t have to deal with the shame, fear, rejection, unworthiness, self loathing, humiliation and the “I’m not enoughness of it all.”

    Here’s the thing, though. Like monsters, nightmares and ghosts, these afflictions hide in the dusty attics in our hearts and the dark corridors of our soul. They’re infinitely patient and wait for their moment (which is normally when we have a bright spot of joy, certainty, love, and happiness) to trip us up and bring us to our knees.

    In my experience, the only way to prevent the monsters from sabotaging our happiness is to face them. Wrestle with them and overcome them. It’s not an easy fight because we have allowed them to grow strong by feeding them with our insecurities, fears and falsehoods. You’ll come out of the experience battered, bruised and emotionally spent.

    But there is really nothing for it but to face them sooner rather than later. It’s inevitable, they’re coming for us regardless of how much we run. They will always trip us up, frustrate and ruin our lives. Until we decide to face them, and destroy them, that is. It is possible … we can lay waste to them and become victorious in our lives and claim that the prize: to be happy and content.

    So, let’s be brave, you and I, and face them down now.

  • Cognitive Linguistic specialist, Jolene Raison’s LinkedIn Profile

    Cognitive Linguistic specialist, Jolene Raison’s LinkedIn Profile

    Applying the alchemy of Cognitive Linguistics as a copywriter, children’s author, and English teacher.

    If you’re looking for copywriting that gets results then the subtlety, nuance and finesse of cognitive linguistics may just be what you’re looking for.

    I’m Jolene Raison, a former director of a large retail operation, currently lecturing cognitive linguistics and teaching ESL/EFL, but with a cornucopia of experience as a professional copywriter.

    If you want to get attention, write good copy. If you want to sell an idea, write copy that opens a window to the minds and a doorway to our hearts. That’s when the magic happens. Through cognitive linguistics I use language choices that subtly guide and influence the thoughts, emotions and attitudes of the audience we are communicating to.

    If communicating to your staff, clients and prospects in a way that gets them to take positive action is a priority for you, then you should seriously consider engaging with me.

    I help owners of companies and those responsible for communication and marketing get their message out effectively. Organisations use my services when they want to:

    • Inspire and motivate their staff
    • Develop effective staff training material
    • When they want to send out marketing messages that get results
    • Design sales landing pages that work
    • Send out email marketing messages that get people to buy what you’re selling
    • Produce winning proposals that help them close important deals
    • Turn website visitors into prospects, prospects into customers, and customers into super fans

    Why Me?

    • If you want a copywriter that intimately understands how to reach into the human mind and heart, consider me.
    • If you want copywriting that creates meaning, stirs emotion, evokes passion, drives desire and spurs action, consider me.
    • If you want writing that communicates clearly in the moment, keys into ideals, values and emotional responses so that the audience is persuaded to your viewpoint, consider me.

    I’m certainly not your average copywriter, my academic career attests to that:

    • BA Language degree – RAU – majors in English and Hebrew, sub-major German
    • Post Graduate Diploma in Copywriting – AAA School of Advertising
    • BA Honours Applied Linguistics – UNISA
    • TESOL certification – WITS Language School
    • TESOL certification on Teaching Children with Special Needs – TESOL.org
    • Business Writing Certificate Course – UCT
    • Teaching ESL/EFL Business English Certification – Bridge Education
    • IELTS Prep Certification – Bridge Education
    • Completing my Master of Arts in Linguistics, focusing on Cognitive Linguistics

    Reach out to me on jolene@fishingforstars.co.za or 083 449 6167

    Check out Jolene’s profile on LinkedIn.

  • LinkedIn Profile Writing by Jacques de Villiers. Rainmaker. Author. Speaker.

    LinkedIn Profile Writing by Jacques de Villiers. Rainmaker. Author. Speaker.

    I fix boring LinkedIn profiles so that you can attract the right clients to your cause.

    If you’re serious about using LinkedIn to generate sales, then you need to be obsessed about crafting a profile that registers and resonates with your ideal client.

    I’m Jacques de Villiers, rainmaker, author and speaker.I shift people who shift the world … people like you.

    My contribution to you is a LinkedIn profile that helps you reach the right people (your tribe), and open conversations with them.

    • Imagine what that could mean for you?
    • Imagine what it could mean for them to have you in their corner with a safe pair of hands guiding them?
    • Imagine what they could do with your help?
    • Imagine if they can shift the world because of you … how’d that feel?

    Pretty darn good, I’d say.Let me help you clarify your contribution so that you can attract clients that you want to work with, and who respect you and your art … and, are prepared to pay you fair value for it.

    Your banner, your summary and your about section are the three most vital parts of your profile as they are what your ideal client looks at first.

    You’ve got one shot to pull it off, so you need to make those three elements count.

    Your profile has to be pitch perfect, resonant and nuanced specifically for your ideal client.

    That’s where I may be helpful to you because I know how to craft beautiful profiles that are delightful to read, works of art, and get real results too.It’s not going to be hard for you to get into the game and find the clients you deserve.

    Once you’ve clarified your contribution, and found (real) belief in what you offer your clients and the world, then things will shift massively for you. Your clients are waiting for you. The world is waiting for you.

    Check out some of the LinkedIn profiles I have crafted here.

  • How do you know when you’re in a cult?

    How do you know when you’re in a cult?

    A friend and I were talking last night about how really whip-smart people can get into cultish behaviour and start sipping the Kool-Aid (a reference to the Jonestown mass suicide where 918 people died).

    I’m sure I don’t have to explain a cult to you, you’re whip-smart.

    How do we know when we’re in a cult?

    If we’re alive, we’re in a cult (ture). We all pin our flag to something, be it a religion, a system, a company, a political party, a personality, idea, ideal or a movement.

    A nation of sheep begets a government of wolves.

    Edward R. Murrow

    The trick, of course is not to get so caught up in the thing that we lose all our rational thought. If we find ourselves agreeing with everything in our cult, we are close to sipping the Kool-Aid and losing ourselves totally.

    One of the challenges is that whip-smart people can rationalise whatever it is to suit them. Intellectually we can argue for or against something with 100% conviction and defend our narrow view of the world. As a consequence we can get up to the most unbelievable mischief.

    When we follow blindly, we can run into deep shit.

    Make yourself sheep and the wolves will eat you.

    Benjamin Franklin

    I don’t have the answer to stop us from drinking the Kool-Aid, only some thoughts that have occurred to me and may be helpful to you.

    • I need to be less in my head and more in my heart. When I feel things, that’s when I’m truly connected. Every time my heart/intuition has picked up a red flag and my head overrode it, it’s gone badly for me. I’ve learned to listen to my heart a lot more, and things flow beautifully as a consequence.
    • I need to choose inclusion over isolation. If I only get one view of the world, it is absolutely limiting, and dangerous.
    • Know that every cult (ture) has a shadow side. Let your heart guide you to what is right for your highest good and that of your fellow travellers on this rock.
    • Blindly following someone and subordinating your free will to them is not an answer to your problems. It could very well be the start of your problems … leading to you losing yourself, your heart, your soul and your life. And, of course, destroying others in the process too. I wrote a small piece about this here.
    • Know when to leave. If an acorn falls too close to the tree it will rot. The only way for us to grow is to get out of the shade of the guru tree and find our own path.
    • Take the best of everything you’ve learned in your cult (ture). If you don’t know what that is, here’s a clue: it is benevolent to your higher good and that of humanity. Add to the best and make it better and become a beacon of light and hope.

    The most important lesson I’ve learned, however, is that we actually don’t need to get answers from our cult (ture). We don’t need to learn anything new when it comes to our soul journey. We already know everything, we just need to open our heart so that we can remember. We already have the illumination we are seeking within us.

    That takes a lot of inner work, meditation and self-reflection. If we get that right, we’ll find the illumination within us and we don’t have to rely on our cult (ture) to lead us. When we’re in our head we get led, when we’re in our heart we get fed (with exactly the right answer for our situation).

    You have everything needed for the extravagant journey that is your life.

    Carlos Castaneda

    I love you, Jacques.

  • Remember the First Time

    Remember the First Time

    A writer never forgets the first time he accepted a few coins or a word of praise for exchange for a story. He will never forget the sweet poison of vanity in his blood, and the belief that, if he succeeds in not letting anyone discover his lack of talent, the dream of literature will provide him with a roof over his head, a hot meal at the end of the day, and what he covets most: his name printed on a miserable piece of paper that will surely outlive him. A writer is condemned to remember that moment, because from then on he is doomed and his soul has a price.

    The Angel’s Game – Carlos Ruiz Zafón

    My first time came in 1996 when the now defunct Living Magazine commissioned me to write 1000 words called Battered Women – South Africa’s shame. This was an age when text was still written on real paper.

    I can’t believe I still have it around. I can’t believe that it was this mediocre piece of work that fired my addiction to ego and coin … the one where I sold my soul out. I think I kept it as a reminder how one can get it so wrong.

    Here I am 25 years later still trying to write something that matters. Do I have the courage, the grit and the depth to write something that matters? I fucking hope so, otherwise I’m going to go quite mad.

    Don’t sell out. Do work that matters.

    I love you,

    Jacques

  • Pain is necessary, suffering is optional

    Pain is necessary, suffering is optional

    I’ve been reflecting on the nature of pain over the past weeks. The shattering of the heart pain that we all feel. The one leaving us curled in the foetal position keening like a wounded animal. That one.

    I’ve been there. You’ve been there. We’re going to be there lots of times still.

    Our creator left us with the secret of happiness. But they knew that we had to come to it in an evolutionary fashion and not have it revealed to us instantly, otherwise we wouldn’t be able to have this human experience. And, quite frankly if it came to us in a flash, it would blow our minds.

    This secret is hidden in the last place we’d think to look … in our heart. We go outside to find it … possessions, relationships and mind-altering chemicals. Happiness is hidden in plain sight, that’s why we miss it.

    I have a notion that we were given a heart to be broken, shattered, torn and ripped apart. The heart is built to endure and absorb pain. Every time it is ripped apart, it opens a little more. As it opens a little more, it reveals our true essence, and the secret to our happiness.

    One day, it will be fully exposed and open. And on that day, we’ll know what real happiness is. But that day is probably not now.

    How do we then navigate our way through the maze of pain, suffering, desolation and disconnect we feel?

    I have a semblance of an answer that works for me. But, it’s not easy, it takes a radical shift in consciousness and bucket loads of courage.

    • Come to a place of understanding where we see that pain as necessary. Why would the creator give us pain if it weren’t for a purpose? They way I’m understanding it … it is to open our hearts to the truth.
    • Sit with the pain. Don’t try and dull it with chemicals and hedonistic experiences. Pain is the experience. So, experience it. There’s a wonderful healing to it. Every time we feel pain and heal it, our heart opens just a little more.
    • The more we try and run from the pain we’re feeling, the more it is going to come at us until we start getting the lesson. The more we try and protect our heart, the more it is going to be overrun by the foot soldiers of pain.
    • Accept the pain because every shard that cuts us, cuts away the shackles that bind us.
    • Let the pain free our hearts and keep them open.
    • You will never be given more than you can handle. No matter how hurt, shattered and desolate you feel, know that you have been given the capacity to handle it.
    • It’s only when we get to an open heart that the true secret of happiness is revealed to us: Love! I know that perhaps you wanted a more complicated answer to make sense of it all. Love makes sense of it all. We are created in love. We are created to love. We are created to be love. We are love.

    Suffering

    There’s a shadow side to pain, of course. It’s called معاناة mueanaa: suffering, hardship, misery, anguish, torment, affliction, tribulation, trauma, wretchedness and hell on earth.

    Some doos somewhere down the line told each one of us that suffering is hardwired in us and that it is our lot to bear it. Whoever told you that is delusional. Understand that pain is necessary, suffering is optional. This story was written to enchant us, not to make us suffer. It was written out of love.

    Let’s make a choice today. Let’s accept the pain, sit with it and use it to open our hearts so that we can become love. Let’s discard the mantle of suffering. We were never meant to be victims in this stories but rather victors.

    Let’s be that.

    I love you.

    Jacques