The Bed Head Chronicles

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, I want to talk about relationships as that place where we go to give love.  Imagine thinking about your marriage, your relationship, your friendships as a place where you go to give love, to give joy, to give support, encouragement, joy, whatever it is rather than thinking about what we want to receive from this other person.  What we want to receive from our partner.  What we want to receive from our friend. 

My belief is that if you're thinking about what can I give to this person?  How can I love this person?  How can I appreciate this person?  How can I honor this person?  And celebrate this person?  That leads to an energy where all they want to do is return is find out how can they give to you?  How can they love you?  How can they honor you?  How can they cherish you?

Tony Robbins always says "Trade your expectation for appreciation and see your entire world change."  Imagine -- and those of you that aren't in a relationship -- if you think about that relationship as a place where you want to go when you fully have everything you need inside of you.  And all you want to do in a relationship is give.  That's going to lead you to, what I would imagine, is a very successful relationship.

If we are wanting to get into a relationship to receive something that we don't think we already have.  Then I think that can create problems because then we're going in with an expectation.  And little quibbles, little arguments, and we all have them.  Bek and I have them.  But couldn't they be avoided in huge ways by rather than thinking about what you haven't received, what you haven't gotten, what they haven't done, you focus simply on what are you giving them?  How are you loving them?  How are you filling up their lives with joy because inevitably what's going to happen is they are going to want to be doing the same for you.  Trade your expectation for appreciation and see your world change. 

Thank you, Tony Robbins, for putting it so beautifully because it's so very true.  Don't go into a relationship expecting.  Go into the relationship appreciating.  And truly it will lead to the magic that we all dream of in our lives. 

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, I'm going to call today kindness and thoughtfulness things which I try to live every day. 

I want you to experiment with every single person that you encounter today that you greet them with a smile, with appreciation, with gratitude, and with love.  Even if it's someone that has caused you trouble before or brings up really, you know, negative feelings for you.  I want you to find the one thing about them that you can appreciate; the one thing about them that you can celebrate, and I want you to treat that person or those people with love and kindness, appreciation, gratitude, energy.

So, your intent for today is to step out into the world with a heart that already is so full of love, but direct all your thoughts to what is good in the world.  What is good about a certain person.  Appreciating and celebrating every single soul that you come across.  I can't wait to hear tomorrow or at the end of the day today. 

If you can leave me a comment about how your day went, and the reaction you got.  I can't wait to hear from you because living your life in this way, finding the positive, seeing the positive, appreciation, gratitude, love and kindness can change everything. 

So have an amazing day.  I know that you will. 

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, I want to talk about how to best manage a situation of high stress, high stakes -- a situation that could cause you to be truly anxious, fearful, scared shitless. 

I'll use a sporting analogy -- imagine that you are in overtime and you have the last shot that's going to win or lose the game.  At that moment -- these are the ways that you can sabotage yourself:  thinking about "Oh my God.  The last time I was in this situation, I missed it.  Or thinking in the future, "What if I miss this?  What if I lose the game?" 

Being your most powerful place to be is in the moment and saying to yourself right now, what can I do to make this the best moment possible?  You do not allow yourself to think of anything that happened in the past.  You do not allow yourself to consider anything that may happen in the future.  You focus on what can I do at this moment now to make this the best moment possible.  This could be for a meeting that you're in or a deal that you're trying to make or a shot that you have to make to win the game.  Whatever it is -- being in the moment is where we are all most powerful.

I tell my athletes a story before the world championships one year in Kona, and I needed to relax because I was so amped up.  It was a day before the race.  So, I went to a yoga class; and I'm not somebody that is very good at yoga, is not flexible.  And I'm in the class, and I'm thinking about what happened in last year's race and what could potentially happen in this race, and every pose I was just falling all over the place.  And then I thought to myself, "look, Siri.  You came here to relax.  Be in the moment."  And I was just fully focused on doing whatever pose they were having us do.  Suddenly, I had a perfect balance.  I felt strong.  I felt present, and I found the yogi inside of me. 

I went and spoke to my athlete who ended up winning the race and I said, "Hey, there is no denying that when we are in the moment, we are our most powerful, our most capable of tapping into our utmost potential.  So, in every moment -- as in every moment possible, -- sorry, I just woke up;  Bed Head Chronicles -- in as many moments as possible be your fully present.  You can not think about a mistake in the past.  You can't think about what could possibly happen in the future.  Be present.  Do the best that you can at this moment now.  You will tap into your insights, your intelligence, your knowledge, your skills, your potential, your power.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, you are not seeing my bed head.  But you are seeing the site where my wife and I, on mornings where it's warm enough, come out to do a process called 'Priming' that we learned from the amazing Tony Robbins. 

With this process, you start with some breathing exercises to get centered and to get relaxed. 

From there, you think about three things that you're grateful for, moments in your life, people in your life that you're grateful for. 

Then you ask for healing on anything that needs to be healed within yourself -- your mind, your body, your thoughts, your feelings, your relationships.  You ask for any solutions you may need or strengthening of what's already great inside of you.

You then send that healing out to those you love and care about, to the community, to the world.  And then you celebrate the feeling of things being made better at this moment now because thought is energy and sending that healing energy out can truly make a difference. 

From there you think about three things that you'd like to achieve or accomplish.  Three things that would cause you to thrive and you step into those three things one at a time.  See yourself succeeding.  See it happening.  And see yourself celebrating the sense of accomplishment, joy, and impact on the world around you. 

And when you're done -- my wife and I, what we always do is we celebrate; and that means celebrating not only what you know you will achieve and accomplish in the future, but most importantly, celebrating the gifts of this life.  Celebrating the things we're grateful for.  Celebrating yourself and one another. 

Have an amazing day, everybody!

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, I want to talk about how to get yourself out of a really dark space of suffering.

We all get there, sometimes, and it's crazy how sometimes, even though we want to feel better, we decide to throw on everything possible that can make us feel worse;  to almost torture ourselves to feel even worse than we already do.  It's crazy. 

So, on that same note, what if, in those times of real suffering, in those times where things like nothing's going right you use that same discipline that you use in every aspect of your life, whether it's going to work every day or going out and training every day or taking care of your kids or being there for your friends.  Whatever it is, we all show that we have discipline in our lives, especially those of you who a lot of you are watching me right now are high achievers.  You know that you have that discipline. 

In these cases, it's a matter of channeling that discipline to your thoughts and saying "I'm in a dark space right now.  I am going to choose right now.  I'm going to discipline my thoughts to focus on what is right in my world, what is good in my world, to focus on the things in my life that empower me, telling on solutions rather than our problems.  Because when we get in these dark phases that we feel we can't get out of it's because we are constantly focusing on what's wrong, focusing on our problems, focusing on what's missing.  Focusing on what feels bad, what hurts, what's wrong.  Really, it is up to you to get yourself out of that space. 

So, two things -- number one, discipline your focus.  Build this muscle where when you go really dark, really deep in your suffering, discipline yourself to say what can I focus on now that I can be grateful for?  What in my life is good?  What do I have that makes me happy?  And really discipline yourself to see the good.  To focus on the solutions; to focus on what you have.  Focus on the things that you have control over and build the muscle of thinking in that direction, in the direction it's going to empower you. 

And the second thing is that often times, depression and being in the dark space is exacerbated because we are obsessing over ourselves.  We are so focused on ourselves and what we're feeling and what's wrong that we aren't thinking about others.  That all we're obsessed with ourselves in those moments and the single most powerful way to get out of depression is to focus on someone else. 

Go give your time to help someone else with something that they're going through.  Focus on someone else's.  The focus on giving back and volunteering, going and offering your time or your expertise to someone that needs it.  That when we get out of ourselves in terms of taking our focus off of ourselves and put it into others-- there's real power in that.  A real beauty in that; and you start realizing the power of love, the power of giving, the power of being selfless.  And in helping others you end up helping yourself as well. 

I hope this helps you have an amazing day, everyone. 

If you're in a dark space right now, guess what?  You are the only one who can get yourself out of there, and it's possible!  We all have it in us.  It takes disciplining your thoughts, your focus and really empowering yourself with the right thoughts focusing on the right things.  You can find lots of things wrong with your day, with you then.  Same time, there are so many things that you can find that are right, that you have that you can be grateful for, that you can celebrate so do that.  Empower yourself.  Be the superhero of your own life, not the victim. 

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today, I want to talk about how we speak to ourselves in turmoil.  When we made a mistake on something we're working on or we forgot to do something that was important or was struggling to get through something that's hard. 

The things that we say to ourselves, obviously, are going to affect how we feel and what we are able to accomplish.  When we are in a powerful state or a beautiful state, when we do most anything like gratitude, joy, love, peace, faith, courage -- when we're in a powerful state we can perform our very best.  But if we put ourselves in a disempowered state -- getting angry with ourselves or disappointed in ourselves, or beating up on ourselves, which I know we all do, we're not going to perform it better.

So, in those moments when you're struggling -- in those moments when you catch yourself beating up on yourself, think of it this way.  How would you, if your daughter or son, your mom or your dad or your best friends was going through the same exact thing that you're going through, right now, what would you say to them?  How would you speak to them?  Would you beat them up like you're beating up yourself right now?  No, I guarantee you, you wouldn't

I want you to try and think back how you would help someone you love so much through what you're going through, and speak to yourself in a way that you would speak to that person.  You will find that you are so much more compassionate with yourself, encouraging you to yourself, and you'll be able to bring out the best in yourself as you would do for others. 

So, pay attention to how you speak to yourself.  And let's start speaking to ourselves with the same kindness, the same compassion, and the same love and concern if you would someone that you love so much and see your world change.  Have an amazing day.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

Today I want to talk about getting out of your comfort zone. 

How many of you have truly gotten to the point where you were so uncomfortable, but you didn't know if you were going to survive the experience?  And you put yourself there, not something that is presented to you and you have to get through it.  But something, something that you decided to get so uncomfortable, so afraid, that you don't even know if you're gonna survive it. 

The greatest things that ever happened to me in my life have come from me, being in a moment like that, where I don't know if I'm going to make it to the other side.  Having the courage -- and we all have courage -- but what courage is being afraid but doing it anyway.  It's making the decision to take a chance on you.

Back in my last couple of years of racing as an athlete, my coach, Brent Sutton, would push me to levels that I didn't even know existed.   He would present me with tasks that seemed absolutely impossible, and all I could do was take a chance on me and decide that I would just do my best and see if I can achieve what he was asking me to do.  And it was terrifying.  Some days I couldn't even move my legs or lift my arms above my shoulders.  And he'd present me with this impossible task, or what seemed impossible to me. 

But the brilliance here was that every single day he presented me with the seemingly impossible task.  Every single day I decided I'm just going to do my best and try to find a way to get this done.  And every single day, somehow, I was able to find a way.  Every day I was proving to myself that what seemed impossible was actually possible, but it's up to us to take a chance on ourselves and decide that no matter how afraid we are, we are going to give everything we have to do our best to try and find a way.  You'll be amazed.  You are powerful beyond anything you could ever imagine once you decide to us that courage inside of you.  And the thing is that when you get out of your comfort zone, that's where everything amazing, everything extraordinary, is going to happen in your life.  Is going to happen when you're brave. 

It's a decision, guys.  Be brave.  Be courageous.  How can we ever know what we are truly capable of if we're not trying to do things that we don't think we can every single day?  We all have it in us.  It's a decision.  Decide today to be brave and to be you.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the bed head chronicles. 

Today is the best it gets.  This is jet lag bed head.  So, forgive me, but please love me anyway. 

Today, I want to talk about worthy opponents.  This doesn't just mean in sport or in business, but I'm talking about those people that come into your life that caused you pain in some way, shape or form.  And I truly believe as I've spoken of it before, that people come into our lives for a reason, and that there's a gift in every struggle. 

But I want you to think about someone that may have said something to you as a kid, as a teenager, or even as an adult.  Somebody that came in and did something that truly hurt you and left a deep wound. 

We can choose to own whatever story that we decide to tell about ourselves from that experience.  We can choose the story whatever they tell us whether you're not worthy, don't belong here, you're horrible -- whatever it is, you can choose that and go on in your life thinking "I'm not worthy.  I'm horrible.  I don't belong here."  Or you can choose an empowering story.  One like I'm so much better off without this person.  I will show them how strong I am, how great I am, how worthy I am by stepping into my power and creating the life I know I deserve.  I know I have the power to create it.  I'll -- there are so many stories I can share in this regard. 

But you hear the people can come in and be an example, or they can be a warning.  And I believe that regardless of whether they are an example and they are warning everyone who walks into our lives gives us an opportunity to grow and learn about ourselves, and those that come in and hurt us, I believe are meant to bring us to a new place of strength within ourselves.  Bring us to a place where we choose ourselves.  We back ourselves.  We decide that this person that tells us that we can't -- that gives us the fire, the leverage, the desire, that determination, the fuel to prove even more that we can.  And that's why I call them worthy opponents.  Because they're 'worthy' because regardless of what they bring, whether it's joy or pain into your lives, they are -- their existence invites you to step into your power, to step into your greatness, to take a chance on me, and I've done this many times in my life. 

I've had athletes leave me as a coach, and it breaks my heart because of what we've accomplished together and because I felt that I had such an important role in that athlete's progression.  And at that moment, as a coach, I'm using this as an example, you can choose to say all I must not be a good coach.  They're leaving me because I'm not good enough.  Or as I chose, I said I will prove the kind of role I played in this athlete's life. I will prove it by going out there and achieving just as much, even more, with another athlete. 

So, what I'm saying is that you can choose to have these people disempower you, or you can choose to have them empower you and to fuel your fire.  To step in your greatness.  To step into your truest strength.  That's what I truly believe is the reason behind these people coming into your lives.

So, take it as an opportunity.  Take it as a positive challenge.  To truly skeptic who you are and to prove to you what you already know, and that is that you are measured, powerful beyond belief.  Take a chance on you.  It's time, and when you do, when you back yourself, when you become your biggest fan, that's what when life becomes everything you dream of.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles. 

My bed head is truly at its best this morning.  So, yes, I just woke up and I woke up thinking about the questions we ask ourselves over and over and over again throughout the day.  Tony Robbins calls these our primary questions. 

I know, years ago, my primary question was "What's wrong with me?  What am I missing?  What do I need more of?" It was always this question that disempowered me because where focus goes, energy flows.  If we're focusing on what we're missing all the time, that's what we're going to create.  We're always going to have 'lack' in our lives. 

So I changed my primary question.  I was at a date with destiny and I changed my primary question, and it really did change my entire life. 

My new primary question is "where's the gift in this?  Where is the gift in this?"  I feel as if that there's a gift in our great times.  There is a gift in our tough times.  There's always a gift in everything that we experience because we learn, we grow, we find our strength, we find more.

So when I changed my question from "what's wrong with me?" to "where is the gift in this?", it changed my entire experience of life.  Again, where focus goes, energy flows. 

Now, I'm always focusing on the 'abundance'.  The fact that no matter the situation, good or bad, happy or sad, there's a gift in it somewhere. 

And I encourage you all to find the gift in every experience you have throughout the day.  But, also come up with your own primary question.  Have it be a question that empowers you.  When you think about that question that you asked every single day, over and over again, does it disempower you?  Or does it empower you? If it's a disempowering question like mine was, try to change that.  When you ask yourself better questions, you get better answers.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/

Welcome to the Bed Head Chronicles.  I woke up this morning thinking about how hard it is to end a chapter in your life not knowing what's next.  And I was thinking about this in relation to athletes, and when it's time to retire from the sport and how difficult that is.  Especially for athletes that have been doing sport their entire lives, and the mind wants to continue but the body is saying no.  Whether it's injuries or just exhaustion or not being able to perform it at the same levels anymore; and that can be quite devastating to athletes because over time the sport becomes their identity.  It's all they know.  It's who you are and we as athletes, when it's time to finish competing, we think that who we are and what people see in us, the respect that we earned, the friends that I've made, the things we've achieved.  We think that that's all because of the sport. 

What if the sport was just the vehicle through which we found ourselves?  Through which we stepped into all that we now know about ourselves, our strength, our power, our confidence, our light? What if the sport was just meant to deliver us right here where you are now?  And although it's time to say goodbye to the sport, and say goodbye to everything that brought you that fame, that respect, that self-respect, that self-love?  How about saying that in you for delivering me to this space where I can now, truly, have an even more powerful and greater impact on this world and those around me.  Because I now have access to everything I need to truly create the extraordinary life I dream of. 

Thank the sport for delivering you to this new identity that is you as your most powerful self.  You as someone that can take on anything because you've proven through your sport that you can be afraid, you can do it anyway -- that's courage.  You can take on something that may seem impossible but devote your life to putting your heart, your soul, your body, your mind, your everything into making your dream come true.

You can be resilient.  You can be relentless.  You can be determined.  You can fail, but you can get back up again, and you can achieve.  You now have that knowledge.  You have that proof. 

Yes, sport becomes our identity to a certain extent, but when it's time to give up the sport for whatever reason, it's not that you have nothing left.  It's that you now have more than you could have ever dreamed of.  More to bring into this next chapter of your life.   The sport delivered you to your greatest place of power within yourself.  Now find out what is your real identity.  Sport was the vehicle, but what your identity is who you are.  Are your strength, your courage, your compassion, your love, your heart, your soul, your spirit. 

Those will always be inside you with the sport or without it.  Tap into your true identity, which is who you are on the inside.  Everything that got you to the levels you got to in the sport, and everything that is going to see you step into this next chapter of life, creating the extraordinary life that you dreamed up and touching all the lives around you.  How can you use all the power inside of you that you have earned through all your hard work, through all your experiences with your failures, your successes, your victories, your happiness, your joys, your sorrows?  How can you use all of that inside of you to touch the lives of everyone around you, and to make a difference in this world?  Go where your heart pulls you.  Believe in you.

Trust you are so much more than sport.  you are everything that is inside of you right now.  Share that with the world.  You are a gift.  Go make a difference because you can.

For more tips and advice about living an authentic life go to https://www.sirilindley.com/authentic/