Neil Gaiman – The Best Commencement Speech You May Ever Hear

An Invocation for Beginnings

Rituals

Every morning, for the last week, I've set the alarm a little earlier.

I get up, come downstairs and make a pot of coffee. As the coffee brews, I sort out a few necessities.

Then I sit and read in the quiet of the morning.

At the moment I'm following the advice of Julien and trying to read more. I'm developing a habit through this morning ritual.

This applies to work too. As a charity fundraiser I have things I need to do. I need to reply to enquiries in a prompt manner. I need to keep good records of projects. And I naturally find that I'm disorganised, if I don't set up rituals.

So now, I have a ritual of clearing my desk as I start work each day. I move the scribbles scrawled on post it notes into one of only two places. My enquiries spreadsheet or Omnifocus. I've made this into a ritual. I do it every day. At first it was hard and required effort. But now it's harder not to do it.

Whether its exercise, form filling, making a presentation to supporters, submitting expenses, if you can establish helpful rituals you can achieve much more in fundraising or life in general.

With regards my new ritual that I wrote about first. Well I'm now half way through an amazing book that fills me with joy, embeds new thoughts in my mind throughout the day and leaves me feeling that each day has been started off well.

What's your ritual? Or what rituals have helped you day-to-day?

Feel free to share in the comments, join in the conversation on Google+ or that other place.

Google+ Guide

I'm pleased to announce that my new mini site Google+ Guide is now up and running.

So if you're interested in a simple guide to getting started on what seems to be one of the more thoughtful and long-form social networks, then I'd love it if you popped over and had a look.

The actual process of building the site has been a new one to me, one which I'll share in more detail later, but for now I'm happy with the end result.

And if you do find it useful, please share the link, mention it on FB, tweet about it, +1 on Google or simply get the domain tatooed onto a visible part of your anatomy.

Thanks!

RIP "Spare"

He was my constant companion since his trip from France, together with his pals Bert and Ernie.

Yesterday, whilst working, I looked up and saw I had only two of my prawny buddies flitting around their Ecosphere . After a search I saw his corpse, under the shell which acts as a bit of visual beauty. 

At least, so far, his pals haven't eaten him.