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Quick! What was the best thing that happened to you yesterday? What made that day worthwhile?

Uh…

If you’re like me (and probably most people) you might have trouble coming up with anything off the top of your head. That’s because, unless you’re already leading a rare and extraordinary life, one day tends to run into the other. Your days then turn into weeks turn into months into years until you find yourself saying, “Is it December already? Can you believe Y2K was nearly six years ago??”

So how do we slow this whole time thing down and live each day to the fullest? One popular method is to “be here now.” Savor the moment, be conscious, that sort of thing.

Personally, I find it hard to remain present just for the sake of it. It takes discipline and, like all things requiring discipline, has the potential to become yet another source of anxiety.

Instead, why not make it fun?

Try this: when you wake up in the morning (or the night before if you’re a planner) create a “theme” for the day. Look for opportunities throughout the day to manifest that theme. It becomes both a game and a source of inspiration as you begin to realize that you are creating your own daily experience, without changing anything about your environment or activities. What changes is how you observe and influence your actions and responses.

A daily theme should be something that is enjoyable yet personally meaningful. Here are some examples:

• Today is about… humor. I will deliberately look for things I see/hear/read throughout the day that make me smile or laugh.
• Today is about…patience. I will experiment with responding rationally to irrational requests by my supervisor or spouse, or find interesting things to look at or think about while waiting in line.
• Today is about…connecting. I will give 100 percent of my attention and energy to each encounter – with clients, co-workers, family, friends, strangers – and notice how they respond.

The trick is to make this fun. Consider it a treasure hunt. Now that you’re looking for them, opportunities to find or create elements in your theme will show up again and again. You’ll get hooked and want to look for more.

Then before you go to sleep, think back over the day. It will be a lot easier to catalog what happened, what you did, how you felt. You’ll find that you’ve lived a much slower, richer day, just by framing how to think and act within it.

What is tomorrow’s theme going to be?

Getting Christmas gifts for certain people is a nightmare. No matter how hard you rack your brains you just cannot figure out what to get them. If this situation sounds familiar, why not got get a fitness gift this year? Fitness gifts are great for introducing newbies into the world of fitness or for giving seasoned pros a new bit of kit. In this article I will be expanding on this topic and providing you with 4 cool Christmas presents that have a fitness theme.

1) COOLBOARD:

What better way to start a list of cool Christmas presents than with the CoolBoard? This unique gift is basically a balance board that you can setup and use within the comfort of your own home. It helps to develop balance, core strength and stability. The CoolBoard is suitable for beginners who want to improve their balance and also more experienced boarders who want to perfect their technique.

2) KI FIT:

Ki Fit is step up from the traditional heart rate monitor and pedometer. Instead of focusing on 1 main function such as counting how many steps you take each day or monitoring your heartbeat, Ki Fit checks a variety of lifestyle factors. It records the foods you eat, the exercise you perform and the amount of sleep you get. It then uses this data to provide you with a list of fitness goals. Ki Fit is an excellent fitness gift for getting a newbie to focus on their fitness and also a brilliant present for a fitness enthusiast who likes to track everything down to the last detail.

3) NU DOLPHIN MP3 PLAYER:

The Nu Dolphin MP3 player is another of the really cool Christmas presents on this list. What makes it so cool is that you can play it underwater. So if you know anyone who enjoys swimming at any level, get them the Nu Dolphin MP3 player. They won’t be disappointed.

4) XBOX KINECT:

The Xbox Kinect is a viable option If you are having problems finding a substantial present for that special someone. If they are a hard core gym goer it gives them the extra option of exercising at home. However, even if they are not a huge fitness fanatic the Xbox Kinect allows them to get a bit more physical activity that they normally would whilst playing video games.

SUMMARY:

I hope this article has helped you choose the perfect fitness gift for someone. The presents in this article are suitable for people of all fitness levels so don’t be put off if your recipient is not very active. Even if they are a complete beginner I am sure they will be happy with 1 of the cool Christmas presents off this list.

Are poor presentations costing you business?

The ability to deliver a presentation to potential investors or clients is an essential skill for any budding entrepreneur, sales professional or consultant.

Whether it’s a ’15-second elevator pitch’ or a more extensive presentation, winning over and persuading audiences is vital in today’s competitive capital raising and sales environment.

Learning the art of making powerful and persuasive presentations in any business situation and you will win more work.

My premise is every start-up entrepreneur, seasoned business operator or consultant can win more business by being a better presenter.

Here are the Seven Deadly Sins of Business Presentations and How to Avoid Them.

1. Not Having a Clear Goal.

It is essential to know what the objective or end outcome of your presentation is. Is it to raise funds, educate and inform, build relationships, to sell or build credibility?

2. No Structure.

This is an absolute must for any presenter – at the very least have a beginning, middle and end. You may be the best presenter in the world with outstanding delivery skills but poor structure will lead to a poor presentation.

3. Not Connecting with Your Audience.

Building empathy and rapport with your audience is critical. Connect with them on three levels – head, heart and hip-pocket.

4. A Poor Beginning.

First impressions always matter. If you have to raise $8 million in 8 minutes, make every word count. I learnt this tip from attending Patricia Fripp’s speaking school recently and I think its brilliant. For business presentations she says avoid using ‘Thanks, its great to be here’ as your opener. She rightly points out you’ve just wasted 10 seconds. At a million dollars a minute that equates to nearly $167,000!

5. Too Much Content.

The cardinal sin of all business and technical presenters. In my media career, I estimate I have attended more than 300 conferences, events and seminars. That’s 1500 hours worth of presentations I’ve had to sit through and the most common mistake I’ve seen is presenters rush and overload the audience with too much content. Remember, presentations rely on the spoken word and the visual – use the written word and a handout to provide more detail.

6. The Presenter’s ‘I’s’ Are Too Close Together.

We all like to talk about ourselves. As a radio manager, I spent hours listening to and providing feedback to broadcasters. Those that really connected with their audience talked with them rather than at them. I observed they used the word ‘you’ a lot more than the word ‘I’. This led to the saying that with some presenters their ‘I’s’ were too close together! Here’s another great tip I learnt from Fripp. Record your presentation and have it transcribed. Every time you see the word ‘I’, cross it out and replace it with ‘you’. She calls this working on your ‘I-You Ratio’.

7. Poor Closer.
Again it is beginning and the end that is the most important part of any presentation. With your closer – what is the key message or action you want the audience to take away with them as they walk out the door? In business presentations the closer is often the ‘call to action’. When I heard Bill Clinton speak at a Fundraising event for sick children, his closer was ‘I want you to help’. Simple, direct and effective.

Here’s another tip I learnt from Fripp. If you want to take questions, take them before your closer, because ending on question time is a poor and weak way to end a presentation. Worse still, you are unlikely to be able to control the last question. Take questions for a set period before the end, wrap that section up and then end with a strong closer. I’ve already tried this on several audiences and it works a treat!