I suppose I spent the first 30 years of my life being a good country boy with not much ambition besides holding down a job that brought in some money so I could survive this life.

The first event that really changed it was when my sister rang me near her birthday and asked me had I heard anything about the Forum and would I like to come to an evening about it. Being a good brother I said yes as a sort of Birthday present. I could not imagine I would be running down the main street of St. Petersburg with the sports minister and mayor of that city that is larger than Sydney and Melbourne combined just a year and a half later after running the Moscow Peace Marathon.

This phone call was life changing for me as I had never really taken a look at my life up to the moment I enrolled in the Forum a couple of months later. It didn’t have a lot of effect at first because I sat there knowing what they were talking about. It was only when they said something my egotistical IQ did not understand or believe at the time that had me actually take part in the enquiry.

What changes our Lives? Is it looking across the room and seeing the person we know we are going to spend the rest of our life with, the birth of our first child, or in my case a willingness not to know something. Let’s have a look at what is said about it  out there:

1. How does one change their life? Winston Churchill, known as much for his cigar smoking as his words says it take old-fashioned courage, the ability to continue down the path of life. Lets be Brave.

2. Don’t listen to those negative stories in your head, go and talk to someone else who will point out the lies they are.

3. There will be moments in your life that you rediscover your two-year old tantrum ability, NO, with this I will not put up with. Here’s why MLK was considered such a change leader : I’ve been to the Mountaintop.

4. The meaning of life is not to get your values from mainstream media but from  personal experience, then you truly know how it affects you.

5. Eleanor Roosevelt said the essential thing is to learn and that there is no experience from which you can’t learn something. My mentor Arion says it  like this: Everything is a gift. At times it hurts me when I try to comprehend this lifestyle. You could say Its Living not Dreaming.

6. Do you agree with this?

7. Over to John Lennon: Imagine.

8. How many of the men out there were trained not to be emotive and shed tears because it was not being manly? Luckily our society has changed and this is no longer such a crime.

9. I was just turning 30 when I chose the latter. Let’s hear from the Sesame Street crew: Don’t Give Up.

10. My God, of which I don’t really have one, that hurt. Which type, which pain?

11. I’m a How I met your Mother fan, big time. If you are not you will not know who this proud and out gay actor who played the womaniser of the series is. Such an irony. Here’s Tegan and Sara from the Lego movie : Everything is Awesome!!.

12. Life will not always go the way you want  it to, time for some yachting lessons so you can sail your way back.

13. My friend Emeli says it You’re Allowed, to live your dreams, she’s referring to. Arnie, the terminator in the classic movie series says  it even simpler: I will do! Rise Up!!

14. Albert Einstein , 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist. He developed the general theory of relativity, one of the two pillars of modern physics (alongside quantum mechanics). Einstein’s work is also known for its influence on the philosophy of science. Einstein is best known in popular culture for his mass–energy equivalence formula E = mc2 (which has been dubbed “the world’s most famous equation”). He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for his “services to theoretical physics”, in particular his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect, a pivotal step in the evolution of quantum theory. His research has changed many lives.

15. Possibly the oldest quote with the youngest and cutest image. Confucius points out how to change your life, begin by taking a step at a time : One Step at a Time!!

The title of this blog comes from another quote: f you don’t like where you are, then change it – You are not a Tree. Victimhood is the booby prize, take that step from tree hood today.

Namaste until next time, my dear friends