I have been looking for a deeper meaning to all the planner obsession I have had over the past year. Besides being creative, organizing my to-do's and having a lot of fun, how else can I use this as a tool to actively create an energize my life?

I am by no means the first one to come up with the idea of using a planner to energize, bring more joy or happiness to ones life. I am not the first one to think of writing down your dreams and ambitions as creatively has possible and then looking at and reading them regularly. I feel that just by working in your planner on a daily basis you are engaged in creating your life and not just letting life happen. But, what can be added to the process that would make the daily attention even more successful?

I am currently reading three different books about creating the life you want. They are all very different and each one is adding pieces that for me are making a whole. I am going to give your the tiniest of nuggets from each of these books and hopefully this will give you some inspiration for you daily planning time.

1. Don't let the "To Do" list rule the day.

Danielle LaPort is a master at this. "What if, first, we got clear on how we actually wanted to feel in our life, and then we laid out our intentions? What if your most desired feelings consciously informed how you plan your day, your year, your career, your holidays - you life?"

That is a very different way of creating your day. At least for me. I am a master at lists and crossing them off. They make me feel productive which makes me feel good. But, that is a rather low level of feeling good, don't you think? What if, the main goal for the month was to feel joy, or peace, or confidence. What if, each day you made sure that there was something on your list that made you feel that one thing. How would that change your life?

2. According to Rick Hanson and science, the bad things in life are instantly imbedded into our beinging. The good things in life are like teflon and are here and gone before we even realize that something lovely just happened. Lovely things tend to rate about a 1 or 2 on a scale of 10. They have to be noticed and then "installed" into our brains before they make much of an impact on our lives. This is more then just gratitude. It is taking 20-30 seconds several times a day, each time you notice the smallest things and letting it "sink in" noticing the felling and being in that feeling. Over time this actually changes the structure of your fear based brain to something that is more resilient, confident, loving, and joyful. To something that lessens the impact of the fear based thinking that seems to be all around us.

"It's the law of little things: a small thing repeated each day adds up over time to reduce big results." Rick Hanson

I found this to be profound. Just one little thing. He has a newsletter that goes out each week with just one thing to keep an eye out for during the week and to notice and "install" it into your being. This week I have been working on Joy. Little moments of feeling joy. Then that dovetails back to Danielle and I plan my week with an eye to joy. See where I am going with this?

3. We already have all that we need to be the best us ever imagined.

"Just as a single acorn contains endless forests, the see of your being contains all the ideas, contributions, and impact you life will ever make - and the ripple effect your life has and will have on the world around you. All it takes is the right conditions for its emergence." Emergence by Derek Rydell

This one is harder for me. I am very confident in many parts of my life and not so much in others. I would say that most of us are like that. Unfortunatly it is those weaker categories,( I tend to be quiet and shy, introverted) that keep me from jumping out into the unknown and going for it (like writing this post). So keeping in mind that I am that acorn and have everything I need right this moment is profound. There isn't more I need to be right this moment to do what I need to do today, this week or this month. I may need to learn some skills but I have everything I need to do what I need to do in this moment.

Putting just these three amazing ideas into my planning time is very simple. I am going to plan my day allowing sometime, even just a couple of moments if that is all there is, to focusing on my main feeling goal. Anytime I notice that goal for the week, or anything else that is good for that matter, I am going to take a moment and "instal" the feeling by staying with it for 20-30 seconds, breathing it in, acknowledging it, and Feeling it. I will keep the story of the acorn close so that when I feel overwhelmed I can take a moment to recover and start over again.

I have not even scratched the surface of these amazing books. I am sure I will bring them up in more blogs posts as I use them. I know that using these ideas are going to bring magic into my life. That is the feeling state I am going for, Magical!

What type of resources do you use to create a more meaningful life?

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