Others you will hate for it for those are the ones that prune you back, they are the rope that tethers you so you grow straight.

But at the end of the day, just so long as there are not too many who are weeds, those who want to choke the life out of you, you will flourish.

So I say be wise and recognise who are the weeds so you can get them out of the way early on.

Don’t resist the hand of the pruner or the tethering which is for your own benefit. Cling to what is good.

Hayley and Adonijah Solich

My 7-year-old son walked into my office today and pronounced, “Mum, burps mean ‘yes’ and farts mean ‘no’.”

I just looked at him and said tentatively, “Yes….”

And he continued, “So, ask me a question…”

Well what is a mother to do?

I asked him, “Do you love Jesus?”

Responsed, “Burp!”

I asked him, “Do you love Mummy?”

Response, “Burp!”

I asked him, “Do you love sharing a room with your sisters?”  (Who incidentally he describes as “The Bitches”)

Response, “Burp!”

So I thought I’d really test him out and asked him, “Do you love cleaning?” (Knowing full well he hates it!)

Response, a very strained face with his bottom pressed out and the comment, “That was a fart!”

LOL…you’ve just gotta love his maleness.

Three hot tips on how to live a FANTASTIC life!

1.  Be Fantastically You

Be yourself.  Don’t try and imitate others because at the end of the day, you may be great at imitating but who will remember you?

2.  Be honest About What You Are

You don’t have to be anything other than what you are.  Own yourself, warts and all.  Be open to other’s feedback about how they see you too.

3.  Serve it up!

Bring what you have in your kit bag, the things that make you unique, to the table of life and serve it up!  Have a go at life.

As you may or may not be aware, I have four children and they are great kids but sincerely they can be quite a handful.  I love my kids dearly, but they can take me from 0 to 10 on the anger scale in about 5 mins, cause that’s about how long it takes them to trash a clean house!

We have just started the school holidays and I made it my goal that these holidays we are going to nail keeping the house clean and being respectful to one another.  I was determined that I was going to reinstate my rights as the rightful ruler of my house (which have been eroded because of my focus on other things) and that they were going to learn submission if it killed me!  I simply was over all the yelling, bitching and fighting…I was going to make a difference and motivate my group to great success – or so went my daydream!

I would like to think that someone could come to our home at any time of the day or night and that I would not be embarassed.  I don’t really think it’s an unreasonable request that my children participate in house cleaning, but it certainly does become THE issue in our home and often.  So you can imagine how flabbergasted I was when my 7 year old son declared to me on the first day  of the holidays, “Mum, I’m on holidays.  Don’t ask me to do anything cause this is my holiday and that means I don’t have to do anything you say.”

Well, that was a bit like waving a red flag in front of my face!  I proceeded to march him around the house, him screaming at me that he was not going to do anything, and me patiently and quietly suggesting that he will.  There was the 15 minutes of standing facing the wall stand off, but eventually he caved because I kept starting the clock again everytime he screamed at me about the injustice of him having to pick up after himself.

Seriously, when you are able to distance yourself from the emotion it is hilarious to watch the way children try to manipulate their parents to get out of doing stuff!

Wow, if only life could be that simple.  I’d love to be able to declare to my children, my husband, my clients, the whole world in fact that hey, I’m on holidays and don’t ask me to do ANYTHING!!!

Suffice to say, the war has begun and now more than ever I am determined to come out on top.  It’s four against one, but with my brain and brawns I must have some hope of success…don’t I?

As I type this I am in the midst of a war zone with my 12 year old who has declared that she is NEVER doing the dishes again.  Well if I let her win that battle then I’m going to be the resident dish scrubber and surely I should have been promoted by now.  I’ve told her if that if she doesn’t pull her head in I’m going to record her bad behaviour and put it up on Facebook…she blanched.  Mmm…seems like there is still some tricks in the Mummy persuasion tool bag yet.

Love to hear your stories about how you get children to do the things you need them to do.

As I was getting myself ready this morning, it occured to me that my life has so much noise in it – my children, the tv, the internet, the radio, the phone, the chores that are screaming out to get done – that my soul was crying out for some stillness.
And it was not the stillness of idleness that I was actually seeking. Rather, it was the strategic plan that creates order out of chaos and brings with it peace and harmony.

So I started to think about how I can apply this desire for less noise in both my business and personal life.

For business…

Create the plan…walk out the plan…reap the rewards!

When I am responding to emails instantly, to friends requests upon demand and letting my inspiration take me in whatever direction it pleases I feel the chaos increase. So I am going to stop and consider, to prioritise according to my needs and not just everyone elses.

So today I have started work on my plan of attack of taking back control of my day, of STRATEGICALLY planning how I shall proceed. This is probably harder than many would imagine because when you are as creative as I am you have to go with the wave while it’s there, but it is essential that I take back control if I am to succeed and achieve all that I want in the available time.

So, the first step I am going to take is to turn off Facebook alerts to my email. They are constantly popping up and distracting me. I am also going to turn of Facebook Chat because I spend a lot of time responding to people and although it is beneficial it does suck me dry of time. I am going to close my email program and only open it at set intervals throughout the day, that way I will not have that noise and the little red number glaring at me asking me to respond. And to let callers know a time limit when they contact me so that I can keep control of my time, eg “Hi. I’ve got 5 mins, is that enough time to discuss what you need or should we set a time for a chat when I have more time?”

The second step I am going to take is to use the system that I created when I started my business – a system of scheduled posting, planned development of my blog and websites. Instead of just responding to the spur of the moment inclination, I am going to become more strategic in my building. I’ve dragged out my excel spreadsheet marketing planner that helps met to log what I am doing every week and monitor how I am meeting my objectives.

The third step I am going to take is to set an alarm on my computer that tells me it’s time to get up and do 10 mins of aerobic exercise or stretching. This is going to go off at 1 hour intervals throughout my day, because I find that my butt is spreading as I am glued to a computer all day long. I am choosing to respond to the inner voice that is constantly harassing me to look after my body!

I think as entrepreneurs who work from home it is too easy to slide into the workaholic mode of giving everything to your business. So I am also going to be making some changes in my home life…

The first is to get off the computer in the afternon when I am least productive and I have my children at home. I’m going to give them my time when they most need it – after school, doing their homework, wanting to share their day with me.

The second is I am going to request that the TV’s stay off until after 8:00pm at night. My husband likes to watch television when he gets home from work but it interferes with our meal and the quality time that we need to have as a family (wish me luck there, ladies!).

The third is I am going to devote 1 hour a day to maintenance of my household. I will use that time of the day when I start to feel most tired, to get myself up and do some housework. Then I can silence the inner voice that taunts me when I walk past children’s mess in my home.

I have decided to make these plans public so that I am now accountable.

This is my personal challenge…what is your personal challenge today? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

In fact I was once told by a sound engineer that he didn’t think my voice was commercial enough, that it was too like Delta Goodren and Barbara Streisand.  Well he could have had no idea he was comparing my voice to two of the most successful diva’s in the world.  At the time I thought it was an insult but on reflection it was the greatest compliment.

So I thought I’d share with you all one of the songs that I learned when I was in high school.

Then tonight I stumbled over this lovely unplugged song on YouTube.com, so I thought I’d share it with all my beautiful readers.

Enjoy!