About Me

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What do you really want out of life? Now what's stopping you?

Monday, October 29, 2007

New Directions

Decided to start a separate blog today, planning stages and experimentation at the moment. The basic concept is to publish at least one photo a week that represents the world around me. Will see where it goes. Stepped out of my comfort zone a bit with the layout and picked a colour I usually wouldn't use but think it goes with the whole feel. It's called Through My Eyes, have a look.

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Half way there


It’s about to rain, which is actually bad news for me seeing as I cycled into my office today. I have patients in hospital this weekend and it’s my turn to take care of them while the rest of the world enjoys a break. Working on the weekend can be frustrating at times, but for me it’s only once in a while so I can generally pay the price in the short term. I knew about being on call before I even started my degree in Physiotherapy and was well aware that at times I would have to sacrifice a few days. There were a number in my class who had no idea, some had no idea about physio at all but lets ignore that. I am very pro the idea of trying something out before you commit totally, e.g. as a student visit the sort of area you want to work in, see what its like. If you want to run a hotel, spend some time with a hotel manager/owner. If you want to retire to the Costa del Sol, visit it to see if you can and still want to live there. That's why you get to test drive a vehicle and to try on clothes in the store. Keep an open mind, it’s probably not wise to base your negative assumption on one experience, get a couple of views on the topic. There we go that’s it for today. Me, I’m off to find a hot cup off coffee-if I can avoid getting drenched. Oh and the photos from earlier today, the view from the hospital's top floor

Friday, October 26, 2007

All In One Place

There is a multitude of different factors that contribute towards your satisfaction, efficacy and general ability to perform a task in a specific environment. Likewise there are multiple tests to measure, discover and unfold them. I thought that, for the sake of clarity as well as my own peace of mind, it would be worth placing them all in one place.

1. Values-these are things that are important to you, the things that determine where you spend your time and energy. E.g do you value family over work. They also include moral values e.g. will you work in an environment where you may have to lie-a lot. Basically they help you with motives and priorities.
2. Triggers-what causes you to work better? What do you respond to? I work well with classical music and write well to soundtracks from epic heroic movies. I take compliments well. Here also you can include things like task vs people oriented, are you structured or unstructured
3. Strengths-What you do well? This includes talent(natural gifting) and skill(talent you’ve worked on)
4. Passion-what drives you? These are things you enjoy doing and often feel emotional about. I’m passionate about seeing young people grow and develop to their greater potential. It’s also worth looking at your dislikes-what you hate (for me routine) or what’s a deal breaker. Sorry but I don’t like working among the elderly for long periods, they drain me.
5. Your Dreams-your goals, visions things you want to do. This includes strengths you may want to develop
6. Learning Style-how you retain and synthesis information. I am blessed with multiple, strong styles but tend to focus on auditory and visual.
7. Love Language-how do you express emotion to someone else, how do you reward people? Do you give gifts or do you prefer quality time or a verbal affirmation.
8. Finally there is you purpose and call. I put this last, namely because all the above can give a clue to what yours is. Purpose, this is your core reason for existence, the thing that permeates all you do, brings the most satisfaction and results for you. Call, now that’s probably a little different-the best shot I can give is a divine/supernatural directed path. I would even hazard, stepping onto shaky theological ground, that not all people have a call. We all have a purpose, but having a sense of God asking you to do something, lets say that I don’t know many people with that sort of mandate.

What does it all mean, what’s the point of this all really? Well it’s a pretty task and unless you use the information to help direct your life then you are basically no better off not knowing. Nor are the lists totally complete-ever. I started dancing at 24 and found that I had an above average talent. I’ve never played an instrument, but that could easily be a skill or strength if I work at it. How can it help, well try this task which I engaged in last night. List your strengths-all of them-don’t be shy either. If you not sure ask a few people what they see in you. Now take key areas or tasks in your life and rank them based on the number of total strengths they match. I got a list of 30(with some overlap). If that sounds pretentious to you, well it’s my list I’m not in it for the competition, yours may have more or less, that’s your list. Anyway, physiotherapy in my current role scored an 18/30-that’s 60% pretty good. Dance got 15/30, again a 50% not bad. Teaching, well teaching shocked me with the result, I wasn’t expecting the 25/30 80% that I got. Teaching engages more of my strengths than anything else I do-no wonder I enjoy it so much. Now there are probably other activities that I could do that match or beat that-I’m working on the concept. There is also interplay with other things like passion-I will not be teaching a geriatric class on political science any time soon, and values-no terrorist lessons please.

Anyway, it’s made me think about my future and what I can do to improve my teaching/facilitating role (one of which is do a Masters degree). Direct impact, bringing change through application, useful exercise for me. Try it, apply it and see.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

Words words words

When I was growing up I always thought that the term black market refered to an area in some dark, secluded and sinister place where all the buildings were painted black and where people of a darker shade did their shopping (I grew up at a time where Zimbabwe had only just come out of a system that polarised on the basis of colour). Along with other erroneous childhood beliefs it went out the window when someone explained the truth to me. The real problem lay in the words. Then there are words that can be easily confused with others e.g. mastication-the act of chewing and ...well you get the idea right?

If you want to expand your vocab take a look at Dictionary.com where you can sigh up for a word a day email to help avoid all those embarassing situations.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Powered up?

Shhh now, stop what you are doing and listen carefully. Do you hear it yet, it’s at the bottom end of human hearing. That’s it, you’ve got it-the gentle hum of the generators in Zimbabwe. With electricity charges below cost and little forex for maintenance and importing a balance of power from a region already facing critical shortages, many Zimbabweans have gone the generator route. My offices are on a critical hospital grid and last week for the first time in ages we had a major fault that also hit most of residential Harare. This was not your normal load shedding that routinely happens at home. Give our authorities their due, they managed to get one hospital on line within 24 hours and we were back within 2 days, rest of those affected are generally still out.

We had to get a large generator to power the theatre where I was performing in a dance show. As it was, we lost one performance due to someone’s inefficiency in obtaining a power source in time. The show itself was a blast, I love performing for a live audience, especially a responsive one. We had fun as a cast and are now enjoying a well deserved rest from dance. Would not like to do this full time and hold down a day job at the same time. Next show? Who knows, but probably not for a while, but I enjoy dancing and will end up on stage again I’m sure.

Monday, October 15, 2007

Disappointment

Disappointment comes to us all at some time or another. Someone pointed out to me once that you can look at it as if you had an appointment with destiny and were dis (failed to happen)-appointed. Bearing that in mind, I was disappointed with the dvd, Eragon, I watched this weekend. It’s a far cry from what I had expected. I have read, fortunately before watching the movie, the Christopher Paolini novel on which it is based and thoroughly enjoyed it and I look forward to the third instalment of the trilogy. I can appreciate the poetic license involved in cutting a large novel into a 2 hour screen play, but I mean honestly the elf didn’t even have pointed ears-a feature repeatedly mentioned in the book. About the only positive point was watching Jeremy Irons in action, I love his acting style. So yes, not happy. The way around disappointment (or failure) is to use it to drive you to greater heights, not to give up. There will be other movies.

Monday, October 08, 2007

The Postal Wars

Finished reading Terry Pratchett’s ‘Going Postal’ and am half way through ‘Sun Tzu and the Art of Business’ by Mark McNeilly. Surprisingly for a fantasy fictional novel and a business book based on ‘The Art of War’ there is much in common. From the idea of maintenance versus repair, to finding your competitors’ weakness and building your strength there, there are multiple ideas shared in both books. The other concept occurring in both books is the idea of forcing your opponent to make rash decisions by forcing them into a heightened state of emotion. Angry people can be manipulated and are more likely to make poor decisions resulting in their defeat. Combine this with the idea of knowing yourself before you know your enemy and it raises the inevitable question of triggers. In this case the negative ones. It’s pleasant to look at what makes you happy, excel and strive for more, but what about ‘the dark side.’ What gets under your skin and why? What is time wasting was a huge issue-your time is valuable so don’t waste it. Positive attribute on the surface but could also be exploited as a weakness…just get me late to a meeting or better still make me wait. Being aware of this helps you avoid being trapped in this manner. While most people you deal with probably wouldn’t think on this level, there are some that will-sorry it takes all sorts in the world and some of the liquorice ones are nasty. So have another look at yourself-I know I have.

Saturday, October 06, 2007

Have you ever thought about why you really enjoy the things you do? Why certain things give you satisfaction or enjoyment? For example, I get a kick out of straegy and RPG computer games. Not racing, not FPS (first person shooter for those who don't play), strategy. One of the reasons is that i enjoy problem solving-I get a kick out of creating a solution, especially non-conventional ones.

Knowing that I can look for other things that involve problem solving-take physiotherapy. I enjoy helping people get better. They come in with a problem and I help find a solution, they get fixed, I get money and satisfation. Good deal that. How about you?

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Jacarandas


Its been over a week without a scrawl from me. It's Jacaranda season here in Zimbabwe, a beautiful time if you live in the capital. So here some photos to brighten your day. Will write something a little more substantial in the near future.