I’ve shifted my own perspective in the last week. Not only because i’ve managed to start hanging out with glamour models and porn stars, or even that i somehow managed to inadvertently groom my 16 year old teenage stalker without knowing it. The same one who only decided to come clean about her age when i’d incriminated myself thoroughly. If Crimewatch call, i have the paperwork and witnesses to show i’m innocent. Jose has managed to convince me to do “Waiting For a Star To Fall” at our summer acoustic gig this month. Will the shame ever end?

Somehow my ban on Sky Broadband connections is being bypassed and i can’t work out why. Doing DNS lookups on every page is slowing the site down and putting a real strain on the server. I can’t decide on whether to remove it. I need to work that one out.

Randy Pausch was right – building a list of things to do in your lifetime is an incredible way to frame things, and if you’re not working on that, why are you doing any of the other things? It changed the way i see everything.

And i wrote it down so it’s on this site. Take a look.
http://www.azcameron.co.uk/100things

We all develop some kind of a sense of purpose over the years even if it is that we have no purpose. Mine was always to fulfil a mission to overcome the limitations my upbringing had put on me and master myself to become greater. As my spirituality has developed it took on a deeper meaner about getting to know the Creator. But i’ve come to realise that the latter is a 2-part equation. You have to ask yourself *why* all this was created in the first place. The answer that has dawned on me from that list is that the purpose is also to enjoy all the wonders of the creation itself (the bits we haven’t got round to ruining yet).

There’s a tremendous freedom in that. A freedom for joy in the small and natural things and a release to be fascinated and hypnotised by what is around us rather than focusing on working for a living and avoiding the impression you are a dreamer, slacker or lazy because you want to do nicer things than slave for a boss (why do we feel guilty for only wanting to do the fun things/). We’re here to walk around in it, experience it and derive joy and wonder from it. It’s a garden. In my list there is a catalogue of moments, feelings, ideas and thoughts that are all celebrations of the possibilities this place offers us. I am just a person who is driven to travel, explore and wonder at all the things i see. And now, within myself, i have that freedom to throw all the other crap off the boat and do it as i want to.

WHY are you in my life, and WHY is that on my todo list? Off the side of the boat.

No “proper job”, no trying to keep her by saying i’ll settle down, no trying to fit in or avoid criticism, no disbelieving or doubting, nothing. It’s who i am. If i could do even half of what’s on that list, i’d be a happy man. That’s what i’m here to do. That’s why i’m doing any or all of the other crap. This is what it’s all about. I’d die a very, very happy man if i could look back on my life and know i’d done all that. The interesting thing is that it’s very possible and i have the distinct feeling that i’ll actually do it way ahead of time and need to make another one.

I spoke to my dad at the weekend for one of those father-son chats (ok, well the nearest thing to it) and told him straight that if he had any will or expectation of me being some 9to5 office worker who was going to get married and buy a house in a suburb that he had better let it go now. There are two ways to think – get paid for something and try to enjoy it, or enjoy something and work out a way to get paid for doing it. My dad is firmly in the former camp (as are 90% of most people), and i’m an easily-frustrated maniac in the latter category. I can’t not do what i love or want to do. Something in me sees it as dishonest and i don’t have the emotional tolerance to be able to put up with it.

What i didn’t realise is that his dad was an entrepreneur who was always in Africa, and my own father went directly against his wishes by becoming Mr Institutional because he was expected to run the company afterwards. Both of my grandfathers were highly sociable, adventurous and serially entrepreneurial.

But the shift hasn’t ended there. I’m feeling a real emotional disconnection with my past and an automatically letting go of what’s been going on the last few months. I want to get out of my comfort zone and start challenging myself in a big way. Tomorrow i will be giving up nicotine, and getting up several hours earlier. I reckon that if my character is strong enough to push me through some of the very dark few weeks recently, then i can give up a lot more things too. As they say, it’s only when you’ve lost everything that you’re free to do anything. I haven’t lost everything, but emotionally it does feel like i’ve been stripped down.

Words change the world, especially the ones you speak to yourself. Watching the fabulously brilliant and absurdly positive Joel Osteen has started to settle into my head. It’s changed the way i see the Father and challenged me more times than i care to count. The way i speak and the words i use are changing to be more positive and it’s amazing the difference it can make. The negative voices in your heart and head can overwhelm you without you noticing.

One of Joel’s points this week was that studies show up to 90% of our behaviour is derived from our habits.

Think about that for second. 90% of our behaviour is our habits, good and bad. 90%.

A habit is something we practice. We are either practicing good things or bad things, and we need to stop feeding the bad habits (i.e. starve them). Amongst other things he talks about is that we are all born with God’s royal DNA and everything we need to do all the things we want to do. The Father already knows the desires of our heart because He put them there, so we don’t need to ask so much as to get in agreement with Him. And as soon as you stop fighting or putting him in a box, He can get to work and start pouring out the blessings. The wonders of evolving your mindset to be positive when you didn’t realise it was so negative.

Interestingly in the Bible there is a passage that says for every wrong done to you, the Father will give you back twice as much in good. So you should thank people who harm you – pray for them as they just got you double what you wanted. That puts a new spin on things.

Another Joel wisdom is that the Father is constantly trying to plant seeds inside you so they can take root, and already has the plan and the people in your future lined up to make it happen. If he shuts doors, it’s to open new ones that are better – because His ways are not ours (they are better). He has a way when we can’t see one. For me it’s the choice between being angry about the past, or choosing to let it go by saying “You know what, Father? If this isn’t your best, then fine. I don’t want it.” Get rid of the crap and all my expectations and demands. He never gives you the desire without the faith to do it, and sometimes you just have faith without knowing why. It’s because it’s a seed of His faith, not yours, and you just have to go with it.

So that is my thinking. If doors were shut, then good. The new ones are being opened. I’ve settled for second best, and if it’s not His best, then i don’t want it. I’ve come so far so fast that the future ahead of me is always going to be unexpected, and even if i don’t know how any of this is going to pan out, fine.

If i could spend my life making TV and travelling the world doing and seeing amazing things, then you can take all the amazing money-making empire-building interests of mine and shove them. My mission now is to work on that list of 100 things i want to see and do in my lifetime. If i’m not working on that, why am i working on anything else? Perhaps i need to don my Indiana Jones hat and get on the back of a camel with a cigar in hand because at least i know i’d be smiling all the way.

Ideas. Creativity. Beauty. Wonder. Fascination. Romance. The extraordinary. These are things i want. Breaking out of the box you’ve been put in is a fascinating experience as you come to see all the things you couldn’t before, including all the limits you were under that were invisible and so binding. You realise you don’t need any of the things you think you did. You actually accomplish more when you don’t have anything at all. When you stop planning your life around how others will see you and fall in love with what you want instead, it doesn’t feel selfish at all because you’re smiling and that positivity and enthusiasm infects others and liberates them to do the same. That leads to the concept of interdependence.

And for all of you that don’t think your dreams can become reality, in just a few months Everyone’s Home has expanded to include a roadshow and the site now has over 1 million words on it. Just a little a day adds up to be a lot. Food for thought.