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We all know that overeating and eating the wrong foods is receipt for disaster long term. But how do we overcome our bad habits? The typical approach is to get desperate enough to make a dramatic lifestyle decision and we know how that usually turns out.

Who doesn’t know someone who announced they were going on a diet or would join a gym or start running again only to quit one month later? Not only did they quit, but now they are more depressed than before. It’s a vicious circle and the percentage of quitters is always higher than those stalwart few that stick it out.

So, what’s the alternative?

I vote for small stuff, done well and done consistently. Sound too easy? Read on.

In Mindless eating: Why we eat more than we think author Brian Wansink, professor of consumer behaviour and nutritional science at Cornell University provides a shopping list of environmental stimuli that numerous investigations have tied to overeating (think about these in terms of what you could do to reverse the effect):

•    The larger the amount of food on the plate, the more we eat.
•    The bigger the food container, the more we eat.
•    When the food we prepare comes in large packages, we prepare and eat more than if the food comes in smaller packages.
•    We eat more when the food is visible and conveniently located.
•    We eat more when the food has an appealing name (such as Succulent Italian Seafood Filet) than when the food has an ordinary name (such as Seafood Filet)
•    Schoolchildren who live close to fast food outlets have a 5 percent higher obesity rate than do students who attend schools farther away from such stores.
•    People who move from less modernized countries to more modernized ones show increased rates of obesity as compared with individuals who stay in their less modernized country.

So, there you have it: buy smaller plates, purchase food sold in smaller containers with boring names and hide the food. You can compensate for the dreariness of these strategies with the pleasure of waking up pounds lighter.

One final tip: Dan Buettner, author of The Blue Zones and documenter of the lifestyles of the oldest populations on earth recommends eating like the senior citizens on Okinawa. Their Confucian belief is  ‘Hara hachi bu’ which roughly means eat until you are 80% full. They also eat from small plates and bowls.

Small stuff, done well and done consistently wins again.

Hugh D. Culver is a thought leader in personal performance at work. He has worked with over 450 organizations to inspire change, growth and success in the workplace. You can reach Hugh at hugh@HughCulver.com

We want to know….

We are completing a special HR Professional Survey. And I am hoping you will take part.

The year 2009 was an incredible time of change for many of us. And we want to know what changes you experienced at work and how you reacted.

We are asking 7 questions of HR professionals in terms of changes, impact, what you are doing differently and professional development.

We value your input and your time. As a thank you we will send a copy of our research results to all respondents.
Here’s the link  http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/VYXYJPC

Here is what your participation will help us to learn and share:

• What professional development is most popular for you?
• How popular is coaching?
• Are you reading books or getting courses on line?
• How do you ‘recharge’ and stay healthy!
• Do donuts really increase employee engagement (OK, we’re kidding about that one)

Please note this survey and the results are only directed to HR Professionals (generalists, managers, benefits, VP’s, etc.)

(PS There are only 7 questions and should only take 5-10 minutes)
Thanks for your help, here’s the link http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/VYXYJPC

Hugh Culver
Chief Ideas Officer
Marathon Communications Inc.

To learn more about our work go to http://www.hughculver.com/

PS: We respect your privacy. The results of this survey will be kept strictly confidential. This is an industry research project only and no solicitations will be sent to respondents.

It’s counter-intuitive and yet absolutely true: you have more ability to enjoy the freedoms of life when you organize the details first.

Of course we can be seduced into the Hollywood or Madison Avenue image of free-living, laissez-faire life styles of the rich and famous. It seems ideal to be worry-free and happily consumed by frivolous decisions like what restaurant has the best haute cuisine. But my experience has been that behind every person that avoids the necessary diligence of creating goals and getting organized there are either lackeys running behind picking up the pieces or their life is actually a deck of cards waiting to fall.

Refining the balance between care free and organized is one of the great secrets of both success and enlightenment.

What I mean by ‘organized’ is that the details of life are planned, recorded, prioritized and managed in such a way that you know that you are moving towards your goals and (here’s the kicker) you don’t have to worry about them.

For example, do you have exciting goals for this year for your health, wealth, family, professional development, and spiritual growth that you are committed to and are revisiting at least once a week? When you are at work are you organized enough so that you can focus on one thing at a time? When you are driving your car are you actually ‘there’, or are you far away in worry-land fretting about something that may not happen?

Being organized is not synonymous with being fastidious about details or anally-crazy about cleanliness. In fact I know people that are pretty loose about details and how their surroundings look, yet they are incredibly focused, clear-minded and intensely present in conversations.

List-guru David Allen and author of the Get Things Done books makes the connection between control and energy with ‘organized’ in his new book “Making it all work”. “Inefficient systems drain energy – that’s a principle of pure electrical mechanics. A short in the wire, or circuitry that is not hooked up right, will prevent the maximum flow of power.” says Allen.

I like to think of organization as how I clear my mental ‘RAM’ so that more important thoughts can be entertained. In the 1960’s George Miller at Harvard coined the expression the ‘Magic 7, plus or minus 2’ referring to our mental capacity for thoughts. When I am worrying about preparing for an upcoming speech, getting more sales, finding a solution to a web site issue, lowering my mortgage costs and finding time to work on my book there isn’t much capacity left for a simple thing like a conversation. Not only is this mental chatter distracting, it’s exhausting.

Do yourself a favour: every week take one aspect of your work or life and get it in order. Create a goal, define and prioritize the steps and milestones, commit it to a planning system and get started. Order is freedom and it just takes you to make it happen.

Enjoy!

Hugh’s adventure exploits have taken him from the Arctic to the Antarctic, from mountain peaks to the rapids of some of the wildest rivers. While his business adventures have included a private airline, real estate, tourism and consulting to leading organizations like: Imperial Oil, Shoppers Drug Mart, Royal Bank of Canada, Sun Rype Products, Telus, and the Red Cross, as well as four universities and four colleges. Hugh is a passionate advocate of the enduring power of vision, personal choice and constant improvement. Find Hugh at www.HughCulver.com contact him at hugh@HughCulver.com

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In his book, Walking Your Blues Away: How to Heal the Mind and Create Emotional Well-Being, Thom Hartman promotes the value of walking for changing the emotional energy around a problem and finding new solutions. He recommends that you choose one topic or challenge and stay focused on it throughout your walk. When you find yourself drifting off topic, remind yourself to refocus on the one topic.

As you are walking notice how the issue changes. It could be a subtle change in feeling, like some of the anger is slipping away, or even a new solution bubbling to the surface. Towards the end of your walk, anchor the memory of your new feeling or solution, and write it down.

I was doing this recently as I ruminated about staffing. Just that day I had received notice from my main employee announcing that she was going on maternity leave permanently. The usual remedies started to come up: replace her, look at temp services, outsource her work, etc. As I walked I allowed the solutions to quiet and to just be with the question “what do I want?”  and not: ‘what is the solution?’.

It was freeing to not jump into solution-creating mode. I started to notice the day more,  took in the fresh air and felt my feet as they carried me into the central park. If anything, I was focused on now focusing - just relaxing and taking in the day.

After about ten minutes the thought of replacing my employee was taking a back seat to envisioning my ‘ideal day’ and what I really wanted. I started to picture a simpler surrounding at work, less paper and filing cabinets holding forgotten records, fewer wires and boxes humming away doing who-knows-what at my expense. It was freeing!

By the time I was heading back to my office I was convinced that the solution was not about replacing what I had, but instead getting free of the complexity I had created around me over the last six years in that location and 19 years in this business.

Within a few days I (with the help of my wonderful departing employee) had crafted an exciting plan to sell or give away all the furniture, phones and computers (except one for each of us). Take any non-essential papers and files to recycling and to move to a one person office (Yup, that’s me).

Together we have made a work plan for the company and are actively outsourcing as much work as possible and she will work part time from her home. I will be cutting my overhead by about $70,000/year and creating a whole new, more creative work environment built on simplicity. No more computer servers, filing cabinets for ancient records, empty office space I pay for, parking passes, security issues and dreary downtown energy.

Within a week I had landed a sweet little office in the heart of the Pandosy District of Kelowna that is quickly shaping up to be the West End (referring to my home town of Vancouver, of course) of Kelowna. It’s half the commute distance to home and has a shower which means running to work with my dog is now a reality. I feel like I am getting a new start and it is completely centered on my happiness and creativity.

I’m convinced that none of these solutions would have come to me by sitting in a room with a mindmap and making lists. I needed to break free from my trapped thinking that following old channels of cause-effect reasoning and really ask a different set of questions.

And it only took ten minutes of walking to get the process started.

Here’s the best advice I can give you: go for a walk.

And we as a society have become a little list-obsessed, don’t you think? We have lists for work, for weekends, for life, for our home renovations, I even know someone that keeps a list of movies they want to see. And now Hollywood has popularized the ‘bucket list’ as a must have.

The last 20 years (think: Franklin Planner, Priority Management, Stephen Covey, David Allen and co.) has seen an explosion of demand for systems to better organized and plan our life ambitions. No question, these are great and useful. But here’s the cautionary note from one list-lover to another. Just because it landed on your list, doesn’t mean it needs to stay there.

While defining the need and documenting it in your favourite planner system is a critical first step a more important one is to rethink it later. In other words, just because your list got longer this week does not mean that all tasks are necessarily going to get done, nor should they.

For years I have fallen in love with my ‘must do’ list. The longer it got the more important I felt. “Just look at how long my list is!” The reality is that nobody (including me, as I am learning) cares whether my list gets accomplished. They (and me) only care about results.

So if you find ‘redesign client enquiry form’, or ‘research more Eastern conferences’ on your list two weeks in a row and not an iota of energy has gone to it (other than resenting its presence of course) consider the Big D’s: Do it, Delete it, Defer it or Delegate it. But don’t just leave it there staring at you in blame-ridden font.

Go for it today and have a look at your lists: What are you hanging on to?

Sure you might be more organized, but you won’t make more money, win more clients, or go home earlier. So, what does make a difference?

It’s all about a new approach to using your time. Showing up for work without a ruthless approach to getting things done is a receipt for disaster. Within 30 minutes you are being interrupted, losing track of your plan and getting frustrated.

I must have 20 good books on managing time at my office. But the books that influence me the most are the ones on developing the mindset of a winner. The tactics for getting organized can come later; first I’ve got to get my head in the game.

Here are six must-reads:

1. Tim Ferriss’s “The Four Hour Work Week”. There’s a good reason why it’s kicked on the NY Times best seller list: it’s unique.
2. Napoleon Hill’s classic “Think and Grow Rich” it may have been written in ’37 but it still works 73 years later.
3. “The Richest man in Babylon” by George Clason. Learn the seven principles of wealth.
4.    OK, I have to do it…read Tony Robbin’s “Awaken the Giant Within” it still is a masterful job of putting all between two covers.
5. “Time Shifting: A Revolutionary New Approach to Creating More Time for Your Life” by Stephan Rechtschaffen. You will never look at your watch the same way.
6. “The magic of thinking big” by David Schwartz says all you need to learn and understand is the habit of thinking and behaving in ways that will get you there.

What gets you into the game?

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