http://myemptybucket.com A blog about happiness and personal growth. Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:33:44 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en During college, I spent the majority of my spare time volunteering: soup kitches, convalescent homes, half-way children homes, homeless shelters, charity drives, park cleanups, battered women shelters, tutorting kids - you name it I helped out. At some point I realized the true value of volunteering was ... http://myemptybucket.com/2008/03/26/power-of-giving/ A couple weeks ago, I had a thought. Wouldn't it be grand to have $1 million in a trust fund? Not for me - but for charity, such that I could make an impact on projects that I felt passionate about. After talking to friends about what ... http://myemptybucket.com/2008/03/25/million-dollar-project/ Life is a funny set of challenges, pushing us to grow and discover. It seems a mysterious playground at times, but at others it seems anything but in a work environment that is filled with pessimism and irritation, and surrounded with negative world news. I find myself living in ... http://myemptybucket.com/2008/02/25/turning-point/ When I was self-employed, I used to be a workaholic. I was constantly putting my obligations and work at the center of my attention, and filling in the gaps with my relationship and personal development. I never thought to take care of myself. I didn't even take ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/09/24/priorities/ At a recent social gathering, the topic of what dreams we want to accomplish kept coming up. There were varying degrees of clarity of what each person wanted to achieve, but what really struck me was that there seemed to be a common thread of "I know I want ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/07/20/waiting-for-the-right-time/ Change is inevitable. Change is constant. -- Benjamin Disraeli Nothing quite like a new job to remind me how quickly life can change. I found myself enveloped in the London Business School course, "Creativity & Personal Mastery" as the teaching assistant for 10 weeks, and emerged to find myself ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/07/19/new-horizons/ The first step to working with unproductive thoughts is to become aware of what thoughts you are having. Just as when you are speaking, if you wish to eliminate filler words such as uh, um, or and - the first step is to catch it happening. Here is exercise to ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/04/24/mindfulness-and-observing-thoughts/ So much for exploring the journey. I like to write for my empty bucket because it is an excellent way to explore topics of personal transformation, and having a daily post forces me to sit down and think. I didn't post last week as I got swept away ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/04/23/unproductive-thinking/ The course, Creativity & Personal Mastery, taught by Professor Srikumar Rao begins next week at the London Business School. I will be the teaching assistant for the course together with a colleague of mine. The course is an experiential journey, and I am looking forward to helping the students get ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/04/16/defining-the-journey/ We see the world through our belief systems. Often when we seek change, we pretend to believe such a change is possible - but dig deeper and we don't. It reminds me of a quote from the movie What the Bleep Do We Know?: "It's a wonderful idea, positive ... http://myemptybucket.com/2007/04/14/smearing-beliefs/