Holding this essential humility gives us the opportunity to learn and negates dogma.

The existence, or otherwise, of what we might consider to be exceptional is independent of whether we understand it, or believe in it and of the opinions of others.

There are many things which cannot be seen or touched, but have to be experienced. Even with experience their form can be hard to quantify or explain, but this does not mean that they do not exist.

I have worked with thousands of people to help them to articulate their life’s purpose. One of the things I have seen in this experience is that people have a kind of energetic compass. We know what the right thing to do is.

This energetic compass is like “The Force” in Star Wars, it can help us to achieve amazing things and it also has a dark side. Our energetic compass helps us to find motivation, energy and passion.

With motivation, energy and passion amazing things can be achieved. But the compass points in two directions and we have have a choice which direction we take.

We can choose “The Dark Side” and be motivated by fear, greed and anger or we can choose the positive side and be motivated by love and compassion.

We make this choice every day. In the way we relate to friends and family, in the way we run our lives, our businesses and our society. Our challenge and our opportunity is to increasingly make decisions based in on “The Light Side.”

From what I have seen in the people I have worked with, we only learn to be motivated by fear through negative life experiences. When we notice feelings of fear or anger motivating our choices we can take action to change it.

In order to make the shift to being motivated by love we need to legitimise our feelings and responses to those negative experiences. We do this by revisiting the experience with a higher level of understanding (perhaps with some help) and applying that to our response retrospectively.

We may then need to go through a process of healing with those who were involved in the experience or with ourselves.

If we do this every time it happens we learn how to positively focus our motivation in all things even when things look scary or bleak.

If you would like help in moving motivation to “The Light Side” for yourself or your organisation lets have a chat.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com

From a global evolution perspective this particular recession is necessary.

There was a growing awareness that the model of business currently crunching, was out of date and no longer in touch with society. An awareness that society is moving to a different level where innovation is required and required to benefit wider society in a sustainable way.

It is difficult not to be persuaded by the innovation limiting idea “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. So while business was booming and the money was rolling in it was difficult to persuade people that their success was a problem.

This recession will be a clear out and will help us to shift society one step forwards towards more sustainable and authentic business practices.

The real loser through all of this has been societies trust in banks, in particular, and business in general. Rebuilding that trust is going to involve many businesses developing a level of integrity that they have never known.

The kind of integrity that authentic businesses enjoy.

Authentic businesses are likely to be somewhat protected from the worst effects of credit crunch and recession by the closeness of their relationships with their customers and their long term sustainable approach to profitability.

Charles Middleton the MD of Triodos Bank in the the UK spoke about this in a recent article in The Guardian.

Through the challenges of recession some conventional businesses leaders will decide that authenticity might be the way to rebuild trust and confidence in their business and their brand.

Authentic businesses generate their profit through the pursuit of a profound and positive purpose. Profit is required, but it is not the reason for being in business. Whatever the specific purpose is, it is a passion shared by customers and employees.

From a business perspective it generates tremendous customer loyalty and word of mouth recommendation. On average authentic businesses spend 80% less on marketing than their conventional counterparts.

Authentic businesses provide a platform for their staff to achieve their personal life purpose, because they share it with the business. So these businesses also enjoy high levels of motivation and loyalty from their staff.
Conventional businesses can become authentic by understanding and articulating their true purpose and then using that authentic purpose to redefine the brand and culture.

I would love to discuss these issues with you. Please comment here or e-mail me directly.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com

Corruption, crime, war, aggression in business and politics, bullying, fundamentalism, exploitation of people and nature are all conflicts that cannot exist when we are at peace with ourselves.

The path to world peace requires enough of us to find inner peace that the conflict ends - that is all.

It is an individual process and, if we seek world peace, we must each take responsibility for our own inner peace first. To be clear - it is not possible to fight for peace, we must simply find our own peace and then help others to find theirs.

A map is helpful in making any journey, so what follows is my best current understanding of the map of the path to peace. If you believe in peace and if you believe in this map, please share it with as many people as you can, we urgently need to move on from conflict.

“Legitimise” - We first need to accept that we are where we are. There is no blame. Whatever has occurred to get us to where we are was valuable. No matter how painful our experiences might have been, if we can let go of the blame, they will contribute to getting us to where we are going.

We need to accept that fear, confusion and weakness are inevitable at this stage and that we can move on from them, if we choose to.

“Visualise” - The second step is to articulate our potential and our purpose. To create a vision for how our life can be. To do this we must let go of societal limitations and soar.

My free life purpose e-book can be helpful at this stage.

For our vision to be effective it must be fully present for us. It must be more present in our daily life than distractions. Think how present distractions, like media or an unloved job, are in your life - how can you make your vision more present than them?

“Release” - Our true purpose will happen if we let it - we are held back by baggage and tensions, once we have articulated our purpose and vision we need to let go of the junk in order to get there.

As you articulate your vision it is very likely that all sorts of negative thoughts will swamp your mind. Write them down. The real work of the path to peace is releasing these tensions.

Common ones are:

Parental relationships that need healing

Who am I to… - who are you not to?

Money issues - see my free Authentic Wealth e-book

Confidence/fear of failure - practice, practice, practice

Location - we need to be in a place that inspires

Releasing these tensions may need some help. Find a friend or coach who can help you through this.

No world class athlete would expect to achieve top level performances without the help of a coach - why should we? Why should any of us settle for less than our top level performances?

“Come out” - at some point the pull of the possibility overcomes the inertia of the baggage and it is time to declare our truth to the world.

Ideally this is done in a way which will sustain during the dark moments that will follow. A way which is so committed that we have to work things out and going backwards is not an option.

“serve/teach” - the sense of liberty, peace, clarity and unlimited possibility of the breakthrough to authenticity comes with a responsibility to share it with others. As we make the breakthrough we discover how much more there is to learn and that learning is best done through teaching and service.

This is my work. I help people, both as individuals and within organisations to live at their highest potential. I am profoundly grateful for this gift. If you feel I could help you or your organisation - lets have a chat.

“Transcend” - at some point we can make the shift from doing to being. We have learned and contributed so much that all we need to do is to be.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com

War and competition are no longer adequate or acceptable ways to allocate resources. We are learning that ultimately the cost of simply taking resources from people is too high.

We are learning that in a globalised world the cost of failing to understand people and cultures is too high. We are beginning to see that much of what has been considered “normal” social, business and political practices amount to little more than bullying and intimidation.

We are learning that the cost of bullying by individuals, businesses and governments is too high, economically, environmentally and socially.

But where does bullying come from?

Bullying is a symptom of insecurity and fear and it only creates further insecurity and fear.

There is a growing movement of cultural innovation that is about building the self confidence of business people, public servants and the next generation. With a population confident in their own worth and their own abilities, bullying at all levels would end.

Self confidence does not lead to arrogance. Arrogance is just another symptom of insecurity. The truly confident feel no need to prove themselves, the truly confident only want to help others to grow.

There is a cycle (Identified by Norman F Dixon in his seminal work “On the Psychology of military incompetence”) where people in responsible roles, who are themselves insecure, see little personal benefit in building the confidence of those they are responsible for. In fact many consider it to be a threat.

It is now vital to break this cycle and to start to focus education and training on real leadership. Leadership that has the courage to tackle the real issues and the wisdom and humility to engage people where they are.

One of the great misunderstandings of leadership is that it is possible to appoint a leader. Leadership is emergent by definition, leaders cannot be appointed.

I meet so many people these days whose “talent” (see my FREE life purpose e-book) is leadership and yet they are reluctant to admit it, because they believe that they need someone to appoint them to leadership.

This is not true.

Leadership is not appointed, nor can it be hierarchical. Leadership is assumed by people who believe strongly enough in something to do something about it.

We need to re-design our businesses and our public organisations to encourage people to lead on the things that they believe in. By doing this we release a tidal wave of motivation, creativity and commitment that will transform the productivity and relevance of our organisations.

The only thing that holds us back is the insecurity of those holding the levers of power.

Do you have the courage to unleash the full potential of those you are responsible for?

Do you have the courage to unleash your own full potential?

Authentic Leadership is one of the key strands of work that we do with Authenticis . We can help to unleash the full potential of your organisation through it’s people, lets have a chat and I can explain how it works.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com
 

Capitalism has some tremendous strengths; the way that it can reward creativity and hard work, the way that resources can be made a available to promising ideas and in the way that the market defines demand.

It also has weaknesses in that rewards can be completely disproportionate and that the market can demand products that are destructive.

However the fundamental challenge with capitalism that I would like to address here is the fine distinction between gambling and investment and it’s very human counterpart the distinction between passion and addiction.

Of course at the more polarized ends of the spectra it is easy to distinguish between gambling and investment and between passion and addiction. The challenge is to make the distinction in the blurry area in the middle where it is more difficult to tell.

Being able to make that distinction is important.

Money is a human invention which we use to facilitate the transfer of energy (for more detail see my free Authentic Wealth e-bookfor more detail see my free Authentic Wealth e-book). While money is used for fairly transferring energy it is healthy and energising for those involved.

As soon as money is used for gambling or exploitation it is corrosive and harmful to all involved. It is just as harmful to the gambler or the exploiter as it is to the more obvious victims.

Investment contributes energy for the development of greater value and implies a level of care for the process. Gambling simply bets on one, possibly negative, outcome over another and cares only for the result.

The distinction between passion and addiction is that passion leads to growth, learning and wellbeing. Whereas addiction leads to contraction, narrowing and dis-ease.

Some businesses operate on the basis of addiction and gambling. Providing addictive thrills and rewards for their staff while using their resources to gamble for greater returns to feed the addiction. These practices although they might appear successful for some time are ultimately destructive.

This is where authentic businesses show us the way. The success of authentic business is based on the energising foundation of passion and that leads to growth and sustainable success.

If we can take the opportunity of this economic crisis to learn and make the distinction between passion and addiction, between investment and gambling, we will be taking a step towards sustainably profitable businesses and a more sustainable society.

Our new company Authenticis is specifically about working with businesses to engage their people with their own passions. We then work with the business, the people and the brand to enable the business to be a platform for the passions of their people.

When a business is driven by the passions of it’s people it becomes an authentic business and can enjoy the benefits of high levels of motivation and engagement from staff and customers.

Authenticis can help you raise the authenticity, motivation and engagement in your business, lets have a chat and I can explain how it works.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com

Homeopathy can be really helpful for children, not only helping a child’s physical symptoms - eczema, asthma, coughs and cold or warts, but also with sleep problems, moods and tantrums.
I am frequently consulted by parents who have concerns about their child’s behaviour or performance at school. The range of the problem can be from mild concentration problems and tantrums to a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Disorder, hyperactivity, Asperger’s Syndrome or Autism.

There is no doubt that these diagnoses are becoming more prevalent with the numbers of children diagnosed with ADD and prescribed Ritalin increasing. In the UK the number of prescriptions is currently estimated to be 461,000 in England in 2007 (Times Online) for between 50,000-100,000 children.

There is much speculation as to the causes of these problems, which might include the pressures of modern schooling, an over stimulated society, diet and pollution, chemical imbalances and others.

Homeopathy can prove helpful in treating children suffering with these symptoms and it is able to treat the child as an individual taking into account their particular problems. A conventional diagnosis is not necessary before starting homeopathic treatment; as homeopaths treat individuals not labels. However, if your child is already talking a prescribed medication this can be continued alongside homeopathy.

As a Homeopath I value the input of other professionals such as teachers, psychologists and psychiatrists and they will often report improvement to the parents.

The initial case taking lasts over an hour and while not only asking in depth about the reasons that you have consulted me, I will also look at the child’s sleep patterns, their dreams and fears, how they feel about things, their friendships, their food likes and dislikes, their medical history, family medical history; in essence the child as a whole.

As Homeopathy treats the person as a whole there are often other benefits to treatment such as an increased sense of well-being and a reduced susceptibility to colds and other childhood infections.

References

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article4813727.ece

If you would like to learn more about how homeopathy can help your child why not send for my free leaflet Homeopathy for Babies and Children.

There are also many excellent books available on the subject such as Ritalin Free Kids and Impossible Cure: the Promise of Homeopathy.

Have a great half term,

Mike

Consultations in London (Liverpool Street) and Warnham West Sussex

mike@westsussexhomeopathy.co.uk

www.westsussexhomeopathy.co.uk

Please bear with me if you feel I have written similar stuff before. We stand on the brink. The triple challenges of environment, economy and meaning are reaching their climax.

On one side lies another loop around the same fear/greed based cycle, on the other side lies progress to the next level and towards peace and sustainability.

The time that we make that choice is now.

Love is what works - love leads to healthy relationships, healthy solutions, healthy futures. You know this from your own experience, think of the relationships in your life that are energising and motivating - they are based in love. The more loving we can be the more energised and energising we are.

If enough of us can live with love in everything we do, virtually all of the challenges we face as a society will melt away.

Just think about that for a moment. If enough of us let go of our fears and are loving, with our family, with our colleagues, with our community, with our society with life on earth; poverty, war, exploitation, abuse and more will disappear.

We don’t need poverty, war, exploitation or abuse - they are choices we make, by accepting fear.

So in this moment of choice please choose love. If you are making someone redundant this week (or being made redundant) how can you do it with love?

If you need to deliver a challenging message to someone this week - how can you do it with love?

As we are loving, so we open up the opportunity for those around us to be loving too.

If you would like help in being more loving yourself or creating a more loving culture at your workplace lets have a chat. The choice is not just for your own happiness or the success of your organisation, but a vote for a more positive future for us all.

Take a look at my new Motivational Coaching web site at www.neilcrofts.com

With love

nx

Neil Crofts

Inspirer

authenticis

inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534

neil@authenticis.com

www.authenticis.com
Authentic Transformation

Barri Can Massana 25
S’Arraco
Andratx, Mallorca
07159
ES

It is only confusion that holds us back.

We have just finished running The PIE Retreat over the weekend, it was another fabulous experience. 15 of us secluded for three days in our mountain top monastery, focussing on clarity.

Clarity in how our bodies can release the tensions that we hold and how we can move from dis-ease to ease. Clarity around how we experience, interpret and respond to our emotions. Clarity of purpose and understanding in how we respond to the world around us.

A collective shedding of confusing and e big step towards inner peace and outer magnificence.

It is a choice that we are all making every day. Do we choose to play small or do we choose magnificence?

It is important, which you choose. Not just for you, but for us all.

We are at a point of inflection, a point of choice and it could easily go either way.

The triple challenges of economy, environment and the war for the ownership of meaning is reaching it’s climax.

We will choose to go either with fear or with love.

If, as a society, we choose to go with fear it is likely that things will become extremely uncomfortable for many of us, for a very long time. It may even be that we (humanity) do not get another chance to make the choice to go with love.

If we choose to go with love then the possibility of a sustainable, peaceful society is open to us.

This choice is not one made for us by politicians, business leaders, religious leaders or parents. It is our choice alone whether we choose to be loving in every thought and action, or whether we allow ourselves to be fearful in the way that we deal with ourselves and others.

To be with love is perhaps the most vital thing we can do. Today it is more vital than ever. Please take the bold step to learn to be with love in everything you do, because the moment that enough of us can be loving all conflict will cease.

PIE is not a therapeutic experience, it is a training camp for spiritual athletes. It is not about healing old wounds (although that does happen) it is about learning strategies and techniques for brilliance.

We don’t know, right now, where PIE is going or what it will be next. We are fairly sure that it will be available at David’s Onda Vital Centre in Palma Mallorca full time for those living in or visiting Mallorca.

We are considering other events and also ways to offer PIE remotely so that is accessible to all.

We believe that PIE can make an important contribution to the choice we are making as a society and would like to make it available to as many as possible.

We would love to have your ideas on how this might be accomplished or where we should be taking PIE. Please do send me your thoughts.

In the mean time if you would like help in training your own spiritual athlete - get in touch.

Please note that I have finally found some clarity in my own work and am separating my personal work from my corporate and organisational work.

Personal coaching will be via www.neilcrofts.com

Organisational training and executive coaching will be through www.authenticis.com.

This Monday e-mail will continue to combine both, because, in the end we are all just people.

With love

nx

neil@neilcrofts.com

www.neilcrofts.com

+44 (0)7775 658534

But whatever is happening, there are always opportunities for the bold. We all have the choice - we can hide from the fear of what is happening, or we can step up and define the future.

A downturn is a great opportunity for authentic business. We are all looking for alternatives that we can believe in.

Number one - of course is to understand your life’s purpose or the core motivation of your business or organisation. With this you can identify the challenges facing society that you or your business care enough about to make a living by solving them. If you want some help you can use my free Life Purpose e-book - or give me a call.

Second look for the “pain” in the area of your purpose. Where are people, or is nature, uncomfortable and how can your passions and talents help to turn that pain into peace.

Third come up with your breakthrough idea for solving the problem and get started. Start on a small scale, build up interest and a following and then develop your plan to grow and evolve.

Lets look at some obvious areas of pain at the moment and the people who are offering innovative and, in some cases, authentic solutions:

Banking - businesses are struggling to find funding and at the same time savers are nervous about the security of their bank - it is time for Zopa. Zopa cleverly brings together consortia of savers and borrowers ensuring security and a good deal for both.

For a bit of fun - take a look at one of my ideas for banking innovation - banking with a flight simulator as a way of making banking more engaging and therefore easier to understand.

Transport/communication - spiraling fuel costs and environmental concerns mean that people are looking for cheaper and less polluting ways to travel and communicate.

Plug in Hybrids massively increase the effectiveness of hybrid cars, reducing emissions and fuel costs.

Truphone enables very low cost voice over IP (VoIP) phone calls from your mobile.

Zipcar is a cross between a car sharing scheme and low cost car hire that really works.

The Hub an innovative working environment increasing collaboration and reducing commuting.

Other obvious areas ripe for innovation are home energy generation, connecting suppliers with customers more directly (it has worked well for Google), long distance travel, localised food production, recycling and so on.

Now is the time to innovate and offer your solutions to the world, there are plenty of investors out there looking for somewhere safer and more responsible to put their money.

Let’s create something amazing.

with love

nx

Neil Crofts
Inspirer
authenticis
inspiration innovation motivation

+44 (0)7775 658534
neil@authenticis.com
www.authenticis.com

All of them? Some of them? Are you aware of all of your needs? Do you know what your needs are and which are most important?

Are you clear as to which order you need to sort them?

Are you forever “topping up” your needs or continuously “spinning plates”?

Last night I realised that I have been going through life without addressing various needs.

Abraham Maslow defined his “Hierarchy of Needs” and for the first time I considered that I haven’t been making sure that all my needs are met.

I had chosen to meet my needs from the most basic, physical needs first and then once they are sorted, move on to higher level needs. It doesn’t work like that though!

Life is moment by moment, by moment, by moment. It is in this moment where you and I can fulfil our needs. It is this moment that we can fulfil our need to give love, to gain stability, to increase our personal growth, to accept and to belong. We cannot plan this for next week or next month or even next year.

“Oh yeah, next year I plan to self actualise.” – It doesn’t work like that because the only moment is right now. If you set out, moment by moment to fulfil all your needs then you’ll be completely fulfilled, all the time! Amazing!

Humour me here … feel this moment. Go on … feeeeeeel it.

Delight in it … dance in it … embrace it … cuddle it … tickle it.

Isn’t that a wonderful feeling?

Every day we read more and hear more of the “Credit Crunch” and so forth. We read stories of predicted negative growth and no one knows when it may end.

It’s just a story. Tens of thousands of journalists are loving it, as it means we read and buy their papers and watch their daily news programmes.

So what happens to that story if we live “in this moment”, instead of thinking about their story; and choose to fulfil our needs and help others to fulfill their needs?

Well then we create a new story. A story that counteracts the “news”.

Come on Britain! Ignore the story. Enjoy this moment and delight in your very existence.

Warmest wishes,

Dan