Tag: WordPress

Simple things matter

Posted on by philipdodson

Philip Dodson Blog

I am sat here, on a window seat of our 1st floor apartment, which is home for the weekend. I am overlooking the sea and the busy seafront parade below. I am starting today’s blog and my mind has drifted and my thoughts turn to a happy place.

The world is a simple place, made up of simple pleasures.

We often do not stop to take time out to enjoy the simple things.

This weekend I am with my wife and two kids, oh and a dog called Cookie, in Margate, on the north Kent coast. We are here to celebrate my wife’s birthday, which was last Wednesday and mine, which is today.

The norm is to buy presents, yet more trinkets and stuff, that mainly we do not need, that end up being tomorrow’s eBay items, or in a skip. I guess, maybe, we are shit at buying presents!! But the point is, our houses, garages, lofts and every available space are already filled with stuff.

Instead, money is far better deployed doing activities, fun stuff and doing things together with people who you love and who matter in life.

At the end of our journeys, we are unlikely to look back on life and reminisce about the stuff we bought. But when you sit with your loved ones, you will look back with fondness on the moments, the activities, the trips or just doing fun things bought to you all.

This morning I took my dog, Cookie, for a walk along the harbour wall. She kept jumping up, as being a little dog she wanted to see over the harbour wall, as she loves the sea. So I picked her up and she was so happy to be there with me looking out to sea together.

It was a special moment, as I had all my life been scared of dogs, and said that I would never have one. Well armed with my new mindset and different outlook on life, which has changed so much for me in the last 3-4 years, I finally got a dog 4 months ago.

So Cookie will be special, as she will be the only dog I own, that will be my first dog. She might not share that feeling, but hey, I am happy.

These moments will last a lifetime.

As will the fun time we have already had as a family walking around the beautiful Old Town of Margate.

Don’t waste your money on stuff, don’t spend your life working for others, trying to accumulate more money, only to use it to buy trinkets. Use your life to spend time with the people, or dogs, that matter.

Test it

Posted on by philipdodson

Philip Dodson blog

When over-thinking kicks in, the longer you let that process run, the less likely you are to do something.

Our limbic brain will talk us out of most things, it’s especially skilled at dangling instant gratification trinkets in front of us. Boy does it know which ones work with us, after all it’s had our lifetime of experience of what weapons to use to thwart us.

The thing is, if you have an idea, unless you test that on an audience, it will always remain an idea.

As time passes the idea will turn into a regret, especially when you see someone who had the courage to test an idea similar to yours. Often in our eyes, we see it as stealing our idea and we get quite indignant.

Then we say ‘well they won’t do it as well as I would’ or we might say ‘well maybe the idea wasn’t for me anyway’.

The fear of not testing an idea prohibits us ever knowing the outcome and think of all those great things we could have created.

Testing doesn’t have to be big, all that is required is to have the courage to try. But that is a small sacrifice versus the pain of not knowing, the regret and the disappointment of seeing others doing it.

So what ideas do you have today, that you could overcome the fear of trying, and go out and test on the world? You never know the outcome and that is the excitement of life, we get to choose which ideas we test out loud or don’t.

Just test something.