THE POWER OF LAUGHTER

              "Laughter is the sound of the soul dancing"  Jarod Kintz

One of the biggest compliments I have ever been paid as a GP was by one of my former partners who said that they could always hear so much laughing coming from my consulting room. I loved this and I've always remembered it.

Of course laughter isn't always appropriate, but those occasions are relatively few and far between. As a GP I strongly feel that my job is to make people feel better and that's about so much more than writing them a prescription. I love it when patients tell me they feel better just for having seen me, that really makes my day. Victor Borge once said that "Laughter is the shortest distance between two people" and that is so true. Kids are great of course and are usually so easy to make laugh. Their laughter is so free, so spontaneous, so uncensored. They're not self-conscious, they don't worry about what other people will think about them - if it's funny, they just laugh.

So many adults have lost this ability. Too many times adults get bogged down with worry and don't make time to laugh. It's been scientifically proven that laughing actually makes you feel better. Just like smiling, it's not so much that you do it when you feel good it's that doing it makes you feel good. Knowing this makes it even easier to laugh and to smile because not only are you doing yourself a favour, you're cheering up everyone around you too.

Think back to yesterday, how many times did you laugh? Resolve to increase that number today. Look for the humour in everyday situations, see the fun that's all around you. Seek it out by watching or listening to things that you find funny. Do whatever it takes to get your soul dancing today!

OLYMPIC FLAME

How do you feel about the Olympics? Are you excited about them or are you one of the naysayers who reckon we should have saved the money and all had 37p extra in our pockets? Obviously I'm in the former camp. Regular readers will know that I love sport and I absolutely love the Olympics. To me they represent everything that is wonderful about sport, not just in the sense of athletes reaching peak performance in front of millions but in the way that people from all over the world come together in the spirit of peace and unity.

It was therefore with a massive sense of pride that I have followed the story of the Olympic torch relay. I watched The One Show and saw it arrive on British soil and I'm not afraid to admit I had a lump in my throat. What an amazing honour for those selected to run with it, something that they will remember for the rest of their lives. I will certainly be going to see it come to my town in early July. We haven't had the games here for 64 years and unless it comes round more quickly next time, I won't see it again in my lifetime. It really will be history in the making.

Personally I was delighted to see Will.i.am carrying the flame in Taunton.

I know this caused controversy in some quarters but regular readers will know I've blogged about him before and about his extraordinary achievements. The games are all about celebrating achievement. Let's get behind them, let's show the world what Britain is all about. I'm lucky enough to live in what I consider to be the best country in the world and I'm hugely proud to be British. I'm urging you to join me. Support the Olympics in any way that you can. Stand up and be counted. Make these the greatest games ever and make 2012 a year the world will remember forever.

LIVE YOUR EXTRAORDINARY LIFE

When I was a kid I loved Jacques Cousteau, the french oceanographer, explorer and co-developer of the Aqua-Lung. His TV programmes about the underwater world were just amazing. I developed an interest in life under the sea and went on to keep marine fish, truly beautiful creatures. Well that was back in the 70's and those fish have long since departed to the great coral reef in the sky but Jacques has remained as one of those important figures who taught me about life and it's incredible diversity.

It was with great pleasure then that I came across this quote from him recently whilst reading The Breakthrough Experience by Dr John Demartini.

"When a man, for whatever reason, has the opportunity to lead an extraordinary life, he has no right to keep it to himself."


I love this quote. I love the enormity of it. I see it not just as a massive inspiration but as a call to action. Whilst we have breath in our body we have that opportunity. We all have things we can do, things we are good at, hidden talents. This calls for us to let them out and let them shine!

Have you ever felt that you are special in some way? Don't be afraid to answer yes to this question. Playing small doesn't serve anyone, least of all yourself. It's time to acknowledge that and do what you need to do to unleash the extraordinary you!

WHAT IT'S ALL ABOUT - HAPPINESS

As regular readers of this blog will know, I'm all for making life easier. Why struggle if there is a simpler, more efficient way to do something that will give you the same result? I think that's why I love this quote I received today from Robert Holden - one of my very favourite coaches and a hugely inspirational man.

"To be even happier you could learn 100 techniques, meditations and mental tricks, or you could just decide to be a more loving person."


I think that's wonderful and it really sums up what life's all about. I also think it explains why I have made the move away from teaching NLP to concentrate on personal success coaching. I get this now, it works for me and I want to get the message across to others too. I think that's why focusing on the techniques of NLP, as if happiness and success depended on them, was making me feel somehow inauthentic. That's not to say the techniques of NLP aren't wonderful - they are and they have their place, but that place isn't right here for me right now.

The bottom line of happiness really is all about deciding to be happy. Once you've made that decision, everything flows on from there. Once you have decided to be happy you will find it easy to appreciate all the great things around you. In that appreciative frame of mind you're more likely to see the opportunities life presents you and feel more able to act on them. It all starts with that one simple decision.

Decide to be happy right now and watch your life expand from there!

RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS

Just a short blog today and a question to leave you with for the weekend. When did you last do a random act of kindness?

I'm not talking about the big stuff here or the stuff that you did and got thanked for, I'm talking about something small, just to be nice, just for the hell of it; without anyone else knowing. Done anything like that recently? If not, why not start right now?

It can be a very small and simple thing. The pleasure is in the doing and in the knowledge that what you did helped make someone else's day just that little bit better.

Gandhi once said "Be the change you want to see in the world."

So if you want to see more kindness in the world then start by being kind to others. Start today. Even in a very small way, you'll be making a difference. You'll be helping to make our world just that little bit better for everyone.

MAKING THE MOST OF NOW

Having chosen the title for this blog I decided to do some exercise whilst I considered the most interesting angle to write it from. As I looked for inspiration, it quite literally hit me in the face in what I can only describe as a very embarrassing and bizarre fitness accident!

I have a set of resistance elastics at home. I don't use them much for two reasons - firstly I prefer to go to the gym and secondly if my teenage sons get wind of them I'll likely never see them again. Now if you know about these you'll know that they come in various thicknesses. After a few gentle arm exercises I decided to move on to do some abdominal exercises and here's where it all went pear shaped. I selected the thickest strongest band; if you know the Bodylastics range, it's the inch or so thick, black 23lb elastic we're talking about here, it's a monster. Well I sat down on the floor with my legs stretched out in front of me and put the elastic around the sole of my slippered (that was the mistake) feet. I held the free ends one in each hand and leaned right back. As I did so the elastic slipped up and off my slippers, catapulting the thick elastic smack against my chin at very high speed - wham!

I couldn't have done it any harder if I'd tried. An inch higher and I could easily have knocked a few teeth out. I felt like a total prat, sitting in the bathroom with a cold flannel on my chin, gingerly checking myself out for more serious damage. Luckily no real harm was done but it brought home to me the importance of making the most of now I can tell you! One minute you're ticking along just fine and the next you're a whisker away from having no teeth and looking like you've done ten rounds with Mike Tyson.

This bizarre incident followed immediately after having been accidentally locked out of our house by my partner and came just before walking out of my front door and stumbling down two steps, twisting my ankle! If you read my earlier post, Excuse me your life is waiting, you'd probably conclude that I had been focusing on all the wrong things to attract all this. You might be right but they did all serve to give me a laugh and I thought they might amuse you too.......

MAKING A DIFFERENCE

Following on from Monday's post about Will i am, I've been thinking a lot more about making a difference. It's really prompted me to look at my own life and ask myself just what difference am I making to other people?

I think there are few things more important in this world than the difference you make to others. When we come to the end of our lives, what things will we look back on, what will give us the most pleasure? My guess is that it won't be the things that we've accumulated, the stuff around us. No, I think what will give us that glow in those final days will be the experiences we've shared, the memories we've built and the way that we have touched the lives of others. Do you agree?

If so, what are we doing about working towards that now? What ways are we trying to positively influence the lives of others? I'm lucky enough as a GP to be in a position to do this every day. I'm well aware how lucky I am and what a responsibility I have in this respect. I have the chance to make people feel better as well as to educate them. I can also inspire them to live a more healthy and active lifestyle. As a coach I get the chance to do this to and to act as a catalyst for those wishing to make personal changes.

How about outside work though? I do my best to be a role-model for my teenage sons. Neither of them want to go in to medicine. I once read somewhere that one of the best gifts a parent can give their child is the positive example of their own life working and that has always stuck with me.

I could be doing more though to contribute in a wider sense, to my local community and to charity. I'm always on the look out for projects to get involved with and support. So how about you? What difference are you making? How much more could you be doing and more importantly, when are you going to start?