Pete Wiley, Author at Blocks of Life

December 19, 2020April 5, 2020 by Pete Wiley

Navigating Chaos—How to Stay Sane When the World has Gone Crazy

The world’s going to hell in a handbasket!

Sometimes it feels like the world’s gone crazy and you don’t understand people at all. You can’t imagine why things are going a certain way, and you feel a loss of control, with the associated anxiety and stress. You hear and read people saying things that make you furious and frustrated. You can’t imagine how they could think and say those things. You look at events and see them ending in disaster—disaster that could be easily foreseen if only people would listen and understand. It’s easy to stay in a state of simmering rage, along with healthy doses of incredulity and bewilderment. During these times, it’s more important than ever to understand your reactions and emotional state, and take steps toward healthy and constructive responses to what you’re going through.

Personal ledger. Two volunteers give each other a hug.

December 5, 2020March 29, 2020 by Pete Wiley

Your Impact on the World—Creating a Positive Personal Ledger

What’s your overall impression when you think about your impact on the world?

Most people would probably say that it’s positive but that they could probably do more. But many are not really aware of the range of impacts they have and are not intentional about understanding or targeting their impacts. Many impacts you have on the world, both positive and negative, are subtle. You might give someone a genuine smile and change the course of their day. You might unknowingly use a product with palm oil, not realizing that it’s leading to the extinction of species. When we think of our impacts, many of us only think about those impacts about which we’ve made choices, like giving money to a charity, when the bulk of our impacts do not rise to

Discipline. A man struggling to stay focused.

November 21, 2020March 15, 2020 by Pete Wiley

Self-Control—the Good and Bad of Being Disciplined

How important is self-control to you?

We have to have some self-control or we wouldn’t be able to get by in life. We (at least most of us) have to get ourselves up in the morning, go to work, and generally do a lot of things that aren’t consistent with our impulse of the moment. So, some self-control is vital, but many of us get too hung up when we’re not as disciplined as we believe we should be, or when we’re disciplined about things that aren’t that beneficial to us. Having a good sense of our self-control and discipline and how it impacts our lives can help us develop an appropriate level of discipline and target it more effectively.

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Thought stream. Woman escaping her thought stream and living in the moment.

November 7, 2020November 28, 2020 by Pete Wiley

You’re not Who You Think You Are—Escaping the Thought Stream

We all have narrators for our lives.

A regular stream of thoughts is something very natural and normal that most of us have. If managed intentionally, it can be a welcome and insightful companion. However, if given free rein, it can be a ceaseless heckler, a neurotic worrier, or a naysaying Eeyore (or any combination of the above). It is important to remember that our streams of thoughts are not reality, nor do they even reflect reality. The only reality is our moment-to-moment existence and experience. Our thought streams are also not who we are. We aren’t characters in our stories who have to follow the plots, we are the creators of the stories.

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Align. Getting work done when she can get it done best.

October 24, 2020May 2, 2020 by Pete Wiley

Time and Energy — Aligning What You Do with How You Feel

How much of your daily schedule is out of your control?

Many of us may feel that our time is not really our own, that we have responsibilities that drive what we do on a day-to-day basis. But if we take a closer look, we’ll likely find that we have considerably more control over our schedules than we realize. At first glance, our schedules may be a densely populated mish-mash of work-related appointments (meetings, calls, travels), family commitments (doctor appointments, sports and school events), and, if we can fit them in, personal activities (hobbies, exercise, time with friends). If we prioritize them at all, it may be based on who is yelling the loudest or what the crisis is at the moment. However, it is possible to be intentional about our time, even for (especially for) the busiest of people, and if we are intentional, we may be able to cut back on some of the activities we feel we must do and schedule our activities for when we will be able to perform at our best.

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