Speculation runs from evil plots (remember the Alex Baldwin commercials for Hulu.com?) through relaxation to community-building. Early on, Andy Wibbels remarked early on that he wondered what would happen if he spent as much time on his business as he did to farming. I think he got his answer, because he’s left the farm and his business ventures are thriving.

Most of us were lured in by a friend. Mine was someone who missed her farmland origins. I tried farming, and I was hooked. As an urban dweller, the closest I come to a farm or a farmer on a regular basis is the Union Square Greenmarket. It was peaceful to plant and harvest virtual produce. It didn’t take a lot of time, though, to get caught up in “the sparklies” – all the little extra doo-dads for the farm.

Communities began to grow as farmers acquired neighbors and earned points for performing various chores on each other’s farms. Now, FarmVille has introduced Co-ops. Teams work together to bring in a large harvest. Here’s where teamwork and cooperation really begin to peak. A band of farmers figures out how to work together to plant exactly the right number of items to meet their collective goal.

Insanity? Maybe. But there are life lessons here. As other writers have pointed out, this does build community. If I could cooperate with my real neighbors the same way I do with my virtual ones, we could do wonderful things to improve our community.

If I could build a business team half as efficient as my FarmVille co-op, I would be doing very, very well. And if I were to be half as persistent with working on my blog or my book or workshops as I am with feeding my virtual puppy, I’d be realizing more real dreams than virtual ones.

Will that happen? Well, this post is a start!

Lesson: it’s not good to be too smart or too fast or too different. It’s safer in the shadows where no one notices you. You won’t get punished there.

But living in the shadows has it’s price. There are secrets in the shadows, and a single ray of sunlight can expose them. You can spend your whole life covering things over and pushing things back and hoping that no one will discover who you really are. Because that would be scary. And nasty. And no one would love you any more. So you stretch your neck out every so often, and then pull it back quickly. You create opportunities and sabotage them. You don’t believe the good things people tell you because, after all, they don’t really know you. What if they knew? So, no one else punishes you. Instead, you punish yourself.

A few moths ago, I was invited to met a friend in Bucks County, where she was visiting her brother and sister-in-law. I hadn’t seen my friend in over a year and I missed her. I love her family, and knew I’d enjoy their company. I wasn’t going to go. I was feeling like a fraud and a failure. My business was comatose. No clients. Contracts falling through right and left. I was broke. My friend’s sister-in-law got on the phone and told me to go pack and get on the train. If I could manage the fare, they’d take care of everything else. And they did. And I wasn’t allowed to feel embarrassed. And I had a wonderful time. No one cared.

Lesson: You miss a lot in the shadows. It may be safe, but you won’t get rewarded there, and you’ll miss a lot of fun!

Spider silk is versatile as well. There are at least five different kinds, each designed for a different purpose. Yes, the spider multitasks. She produces silk for building, silk for nurturing and silk for capturing and storing food.

So many women I know are strong and resilient. They hold many times their weight in responsibilities. They stretch themselves thinner and thinner and bounce back.

Are you made of spider silk?

How are your inner demons doing today? I’ve been busy grappling with mine over the past few months. It’s not easy, is it?

I was thinking about Rick Carson’s Taming Your Gremlin this morning and have just taken it off the shelf to re-read. The concepts are simple and clear to understand. Implementation is a lifetime process; Carson helps me understand that it can be fun. Simply Notice … Choose and Play with Options … Be in Process. Buy the book! I’m off to play with the “You Can’t Do This”  Gremlin.

What about your future? How much time have you spent researching your own life? As an old career planning book said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’re liable to end up somewhere else.” If any future will do, stop reading now. If , instead, you have some ideas about your destination, take a few minutes to create three simple scenarios:

In six months, I will be:

In one year, I will be:

In five years, I will be:

How easy was that? Now you have the start of a roadmap. Look backwards from the 5-year vantage point. What does it feel like to be there? What did you have to do to get there?

Go back another step. Look at where you are a year from now. Again, generate some action steps.

Finally, look at your 6 month vision. Ask one final question:

What can I do, starting today, to get there?

Goals can be tricky things. Some experts say that the only way to get ahead is to have specific, measurable goals. Another advocates ditching goals altogether. Yet another focuses on intentions. Cooper does a nice job of resolving this issue by setting up a continuum.

Most people don’t get very far, he says, because their goals are too narrow. He calls the first level of goals “stop goals.” You’re familiar with these – I’m going to stop spending and zero out my credit card balances; I’m going to stop eating. These are limiting because there’s no new state. Once you’ve accomplished the goal, what’s Next?

Usual goals have outcomes, but are still very limiting. If your goal is to save $1,000, what comes next? The solution? Think of some sort of stretch goals – often called Big Hairy Audacious Goals – that leaves you plenty of room to grow. Cooper contends that this is not enough either and can still be limiting. Get thin … win the marathon … become a multimillionaire …. These all sound good, don’t they? These are BHAGs that could take a lot of time and energy.

Go even further, Cooper urges. Set what he calls Open Space Goals. Open Space Goals allow room for creativity and growth in many directions. Open Space Goals allow us to create whole new ways of being. What if your goal moved from becoming a multimillionaire to financial freedom? This would mean that you wouldn’t be limited to the pursuit of money; your goal would also include lifestyle choices. You might decide that riches are less important than quality of life. Or you might want both. Helping the victims of Katrina might grow into finding ways to sustain residents in safe housing in storm-prone areas throughout the world.

Cooper’s model makes me think harder about how far I can stretch. What if we all thought and worked as if there were no limits?

So, today I’ll get back out there and walk some more, on the theory that I can walk out this pain. Maybe I’ll just have more pain – who knows? All I know is that I’m not giving up. I want to feel better – and if feeling worse for a while is the way to get there, I guess I’ll just do it.

I know that in a few days I’ll see different (lower) numbers on the scale, the blood pressure meter and the blood sugar level – three sets of numbers that are getting to be common among us “upper midlife” folks. I’ll be able to measure these changes and rejoice in the results. I’ll be able to walk faster and farther. My clothes will fit better. I’ll be stronger.

I’m working through a lot of other changes that probably aren’t going to be as obvious from the outside. I’m working on letting go of a couple of tons of old garbage, misconceptions, negative thinking, and limiting beliefs. And that hurts too. Breaking up is hard to do – especially, it turns out, when you’re breaking up with a way of thinking and being that no longer serves you.

I’ve been reading and journaling and writing forgiveness letters. I’ve been rereading Martha Beck and Abraham-Hicks. Wayne Dyer and Deepak Choprah echo in my ears as I commute. My Buddhist practice supports and frames all of this. Affirmations and reminders fill my workspace. Really, all these sources say the same thing, each in a slightly different way. They all show different ways to do a few things that look oh so simple on paper:

1. Live in the present
2. Know what you want and ask for it
3. Be receptive
4. Be mindful
5. Love yourself

What a nice, short list.  How easy to read it. Harder to achieve it and live it, though.

So, I struggle. And get support from my two excellent coaches and my wonderful friends. And struggle. And cry. And keep at it.

It hurts. Change isn’t easy, whether it’s your body or your spirit. I measure this change too, although the measures are more subtle. I measure it in moments when I know exactly who I am, in days when I am at peace, in acts of kindness – given and accepted. I measure it in what I no longer need. I measure it in days when I see clearly what thinking does and does not serve me.

This is from an Osho Zen Tarot card that gives me hope:

The pain is not to make you sad, remember. That’s where people go on missing …. This pain is just to make you more alert – because people become alert only when the arrow goes deep into their heart and wounds them. Otherwise they don’t become alert. … The arrow is hurting: it can be used.

The pain is not to make you miserable, the pain is to make you more aware! And when you are aware, misery disappears.

That’s from Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll.

Coaches are often asking our clients to believe “impossible” things? Their biggest dreams may not seem possible when they come to us, and – presto chango – they’re accomplished. Or it feels that way. Really, it’s a process of reframing and providing support. We create a climate where the so-called impossible becomes possible, then likely, then probable, then real.

First the dream, then the reality. First the vision, then the action plan. I think that, beyond support, we bring clarity, perspective, and alternate framings. We help clients become very clear about their dreams by fleshing out, then honing in on their dreams. We bring perspective by helping clients plan steps to reach their dream. We look with them through their lens, then invite them to look through other lenses.

And underneath all this work is hope and belief. Stanton Friedman, Nuclear Physicist, said it beautifully: Absence of evidence is not evidence for absence.

So, what’s the up side of these shows? Top Chef , even through all the editing and drama, shows creativity and resilience and sometimes even some interesting food. All of the contestants were certainly accomplished chefs or they wouldn’t have made the cut. The show itself doesn’t necessarily test cooking skills. Instead, it tests creativity, flexibility, sometimes teamwork, and the ability to perform under pressure. I can’t say that Project Runway has made me want to buy anything from these designers, but, again, it’s fascinating to see what can be done in a tight time frame – and with some pretty unlikely materials, on occasion.

Will a new wardrobe change your life? Despite the impression that What Not to Wear gives sometimes, the answer remains no.  It’s the off-camera conversations that we sometimes see a glimpse of that are interesting about this show. It’s not really about wardrobe, although there are plenty of good ideas about what is and is not flattering for the less-than-perfectly-shaped, it’s about self-care and self-esteem.

Mindless escapism? Yes, certainly. And a few good life lessons as well.

Are we only happy when fortune smiles on us? Studies show that lottery winners actually are slightly happy than the general population, but not by a great degree. Happiness turns out to be much more complex. It’s not a single thing and it has to do with our adaptation to what’s going on in our lives. As you might expect, happiness is also not meant to be a permanent state. Euphoria can get you locked up. As in all things, moderation is a wise choice.

Ed Diener, in a presentation at the Congress, defined happiness as subjective well-being. This explains miserable rich people and others finding great contentment in reduced circumstances. Diener broke happiness into two major areas: life satisfaction and positive engagement.

This made such good sense to me! Life satisfaction – income, basic needs being met, conveniences – is important, true, but not everything. Absence of these things is probably more important than their presence. This is why more money can give us greater life satisfaction, but doesn’t actually create positive feelings.

Positive feelings, it turns out, come from positive engagement. Public trust, learning, flow, and social support – all factors in positive engagement – activate a whole different part of our brain.

Diener suggested another major distinction. He differentiated wanting and liking. Wanting is centered in the thinking part of our brain while liking is centered in feeling – in the pleasure centers. So, for a materialist, happiness might be having what we want, while for a positive psychologist, it’s liking what you have.

How can you be happier? Learn to WANT what you will LIKE. When you want something, make a list of what it will bring into your life. Make an informed decision by comparing that list (choice components) to a list of what you like (enjoyment list) and look for overlap. If there’s little or none, maybe you don’t really want this.

Why might you want to be happy? Happy people live about five years longer, earn more, are more creative, and have more family and friends. If there’s a tiger in your path, it’s no time to be happy. Otherwise, as the song says, “Don’t worry – be happy!”